January 15, 2001

 URGENT ACTION!!!

 URGENT ACTION URGENT

 ETHIOPIAN REFUGEES IN THE SUDAN FACE FORCED REPATRIATION DESPITE the pleas by SOCEPP and other Ethiopian human rights bodies, the UNHCR is going ahead with the ill-disguised forced repatriation of Ethiopian refugees from the Sudan. The local UNHCR, which has repeatedly been accused of colliding with the EPRDF government in Addis Abeba , has finished what it calls screening and has decided to repatriate most of the refugees.

The decision is without any appeal. The concerned refugees have called for an international protest directed against the UNHCR's arbitrary decision. Already, the refugees in Port Sudan have voiced their protest publicly. Refugees in the Um'Gulja camp have been told that they would be vacated son since the land has been sold. Water supply will be cut, the reports also indicate. From Um'rakuba to Port Sudan and Khartoum, the Ethiopian refugees are in disarray as they face deportation following a wrong and baseless conclusion by the UNHCR that the refugees face no dangers to their lives if they return to Ethiopia.

 SOCEPP hs tried to call on the UNHCR to see the error of its decision but to no avail. It is to be note that refugees deported from the Sudan in the past have been jailed and "disappeared" by the EPRDF government (ex. Azanaw Demile and many others). The UNHCR is thus responsible for the loss of lives that its arbitrary decision will surely entail. SOCEPP calls on all Ethiopians and peace loving peoples and governments to voice immediate and forceful condemnation of the UNHCR move and to call on the government of the Sudan to block/revoke the UNHCR's decision to hand over political refugees to the EPRDF government.

SOCEPP