Around 70 families from Dadaab refugee camps in Kenya have returned to their home areas in Elwak during January 2014, according to the Elwak local administration. Aden Derow, Elwak’s officer in charge of resettling returnees, said this brought to 925 families the number of returnees over the past six months.
Fadumo Hussein, a mother of 10, who had been living in Dadaab for the past three years, was among the families coming home to Elwak. “We left the camps due to the worsening security there and living conditions,” Hussein told Radio Ergo’s local reporter. “And we returned home because we feel safer here,” she added.
UNHCR last month opened an office in Dadaab to facilitate the voluntary repatriation of Somali refugees, under a tripartite agreement signed between Somalia, Kenya and the UNHCR. However, Radio Ergo’s reporter said the refugees arriving in Elwak had done so alone and at their cost, not with any assistance from UNHCR.
Muhyadin Ahmed Roble
