Safe resettlement of Burundi massacre survivors to begin

Discussions between the UN and Burundi government have begun today into the transfer of survivors of last week’s massacre of Congolese refugees to a safe new camp.

The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) announced that work would begin shortly on a site of safe refuge following Friday night’s slaughter which claimed the lives of 150 people.

The new camp will be at Giharo in the south-eastern province of Rutana, about 120 kilometres from the Burundi capital of Bujumbura – and far away from its border with the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) where the massacre happened. The border area has been given the second most dangerous rating by the UN security alert system.

“We hope to begin relocating the refugees there as soon as basic services have been set up,” UNHCR spokesperson Jennifer Pagonis said.

The Gatumba camp, 15 kilometres outside Bujumbura near the DRC border town of Uvira, sheltered 860 Congolese Banyamulenge (ethnic Tutsi) before the massacre in which 151 people died. Corpses were mutilated and decapitated, others burned beyond recognition, heads were smashed in and mothers were killed while trying to protect their children with their own bodies, according to UNHCR reports.

Gatumba was one of three transit centres sheltering 20,000 Congolese fleeing the DRC's South Kivu province where disgruntled commanders protesting the alleged mistreatment of the Banyamulenge rebelled in June.

Burundi's ethnic Hutu rebel Forces Nationales de Liberation (FNL), the only group which has not joined the country's peace process, claimed responsibility for the massacre.

Security has been increased in the two other transit centres at Karurama and Rugombo, and UN peacekeepers, deployed in missions in both countries, have heightened security precautions on either side of the frontier.

(gmcg)