CHAD: REFUGEE PROTECTION AND IDP PULL

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 NDJAMENA 000590

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE
SIPDIS

DEPARTMENT FOR AF, AF/C, AF/SPG, D, DRL, DS/IP/ITA,
DS/IP/AF, H, INR, INR/GGI, PRM, USAID/OTI AND USAID/W FOR
DAFURRMT; LONDON AND PARIS FOR AFRICAWATCHERS; GENEVA FOR
CAMPBELL, ADDIS/NAIROBI/KAMPALA FOR REFCOORDS

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PGOV PHUM PREF ASEC CD SU
SUBJECT: CHAD: REFUGEE PROTECTION AND IDP PULL

REF: A. NDJAMENA 547


B. NDJAMENA 576

NDJAMENA 00000590 001.2 OF 002



1. (SBU) Summary: Ideas for immediate refugee protection
are few and far between, according to those working the issue
in Ndjamena. UNHCR will explore devoting more resources to
paying and equipping gendarmes. The AU could be pressed to
send more AMIS missions across the border. Chadian Foreign
Minister says if Sudan opposes blue hats, send them to Chad.
Meanwhile, ICRC worries that insecurity east of Goz Beida is
prompting the UN agencies to move to providing IDP assistance
in Goz Beida, where it safer for international personnel but
far from the border area. Having come out strongly in our
recent press guidance on our commitment to protection of
refugees, we need a plan for how to follow through. End
Summary.


2. (SBU) ICRC and UNHCR representatives called on Ambassador
Wall April 20 and 21. All agreed that whatever else
President Deby accomplished with his combative announcement
April 15 (rupture with Sudan, oil deadline, refugees deadline
-- the latter two since modified),he had gotten attention
and, in particular, drawn international attention to the
problem of protection for the refugees strung out in 12 camps
along the eastern border.

UNHCR
--------------

3. (SBU) The Ambassador asked UNHCR representatives Ana
Liria-Frach and Rufin-Gilbert Loubaki, in view of recent
press statements committing the United States to protecting
the refugees, what were we actually able to do? He had seen
Chadian Foreign Minister Allam-mi earlier in the day, April
21, and Allam-mi had said that, if Sudan was reluctant to
have UN forces in Darfur, Chad would be happy to welcome UN
forces to Chad. UN forces could take care of protecting the
refugees, which Allam-mi readily said Chad was not able to
do. Liria-Franch said this idea should be considered, but it
had two flaws, first that it would take a long time and the
need was immediate, and second that it would not address
protecting the refugees in Darfur.


4. (SBU) Liria-Franch said that the AU two days earlier had
sent a mission by helicopter from Nyala to the refugee camps
in Chad for a brief monitoring exercise. She suggested that
the AU could be requested to regularize such (now-infrequent)
visits and make them more numerous, say twice a week,
dedicating a helicopter to Goz Beida.


5. (SBU) The Ambassador asked whether UNHCR could provide
significantly more assistance to Chadian gendarmes in the
camps. Liria-Franch said that UNHCR already paid for 235
unarmed gendarmes (between 15 and 20 per camp),who
supplemented the refugee surveillance committees in each
camp. They mainly provided security within the camps and
within a five-kilometer belt around the camps, settling
intra-camp strife and handling grievances with the local
population. Now they were going to be used also to escort
convoys between cities, especially following the increase in
carjackings (two cars of MSF and CARE had been taken the
previous day in the Iriba area). The Minister of Territorial
Administration had repeatedly pressed for a doubling of this
gendarme assistance, in answer to every plea for greater
protection of the camps. Liria-Franch said that she had been
reluctant to accede to this request as it was open-ended, was
a diversion of limited resources away from direct
humanitarian assistance, and was not an attractive use of
funds from the donor standpoint. However, she said, it now
appeared necessary.


6. (SBU) Liria-Franch said UNHCR had been giving
consideration to moving the Goz Amer camp -- the most exposed
from the standpoint of attack from the east -- north to Gaga.
However, moving 15,000 people at a time of heightened
insecurity posed a daunting challenge. Meanwhile, the large
stocks of food at Goz Amer (built up in anticipation of the
coming rainy season) comprised a tempting target for Arab

NDJAMENA 00000590 002.2 OF 002


marauders. The rains would cut Goz Amer off from Goz Beida
for periods of time. Liria-Franch wondered whether the
Chadian rebels might also target the area.


7. (SBU) The Ambassador said that he had just visited the
Goz Beida/Goz Amer area April 19 and had talked to refugees
and IDPs. It was evident that the IDP problem was not
relenting. Attacks on them were continuing, even if such
attacks were far from being as systematic, sweeping, and
brutal as had occurred in Darfur. Among the IDPs, the
overwhelming concern was security rather than humanitarian
assistance; if they could not go back home before the rains,
they would stay where they had arrived, plant as best they
could, and pass the rainy season there, hoping to go home
later. He asked whether UN-provided assistance in the Goz
Beida area were beginning to be a "pull factor," drawing to
Goz Beida IDPs who would otherwise remain closer to the
border. Liria-Franch said she did not believe that enough
assistance was being provided as yet to account for the flow
of IDPs toward Goz Beida, but UN agencies were being heavily
criticized about not doing enough to assist the IDPs.
Assistance would therefore grow, and the pull factor would
grow.

ICRC
--------------

8. (SBU) ICRC's head of delegation, Thomas Merkelbach, told
the Ambassador April 20 that while the number of IDP's in the
Goz Beida area was increasing, the bulk of the IDPs still
remained along the border or along the Wadi Kadja,
particularly at Koloy. The Dadjo people affected by the
attacks since December still, by and large, wanted to stay
close to their homes along the border. Meetings he had had
with the UN agencies suggested that these agencies were under
increasing pressure to begin significant assistance programs
for the IDPs, but since the border area was too insecure for
UN personnel, assistance would have to be provided where it
was deemed adequately secure, i.e., in Goz Beida. Previous
policy coordinated among the UN agencies and NGOs was that
any assistance would be provided as close to the border as
possible, to obviate the pull factor. That policy now
appeared to be being eroded. Merkelbach said it was
essential to plan for IDP assistance and bring in food and
supplies adequate to meet the anticipated need; ICRC was
planning for 40,000 IDPs while UNHCR for 60,000 (UNHCR opting
for higher numbers since it typically received less than it
asked for). However, timing of where and how much assistance
to provide was vital, and assistance ought not to be provided
simply because it was necessary to be seen to be responding
and especially to do so at a place where it was convenient
for the UN or NGOs rather than for the IDPs. These IDPs were
still refreshingly keen to return home and had not been
asking for assistance. However, a significant program of
assistance in Goz Beida might quickly turn them into
"professional beneficiaries."


9. (SBU) Merkelbach said he had sent his staff back to
Dogdore (between Goz Amer and the border) and he was debating
whether it was safe enough to send them also back to Koloy.
(He needed more assurance from contacts among janjaweed and
rebels, as well as the Dadjos and Chadian authorities, that
an ICRC presence would be acceptable. He expected to send
his staff back to Koloy soon, barring a marked security
deterioration, while the UN agencies were not likely to be
allowed to go to Koloy any time soon.) His staff reported
that the IDP population at Dogdore had jumped from 2500 to
4000 in a relatively short period. There had been three or
four attacks on villages near the border north of Daguessa,
following the April 10 rebel raid on Koukou and Goz Amer.
These villages had not been attacked previously.


10. (SBU) Comment: Our press statements take a forthright
stand on protection of refugees. We now need to develop a
plan for making good on that commitment.
WALL