Sunday, December 23, 2012
BY KIBIWOTT KOROSS
KENYA’s decision to place refugees and asylum seekers in camps away from urban centres is a discriminatory and unlawful restriction on freedom of movement, Amnesty International said.
Amnesty International said the Dadaab camp is already “extremely overcrowded” Kathryn Achilles, Amnesty Interna- tional’s East Africa expert said the additional influx of refugees in urban areas will present grave human rights violations and strain the essential services.
Thousands of refugees from Somalia living in urban centres including the capital, Nairobi, will be required to move to the Dadaab refugee camp, while those from other countries will be required to move to the Kakuma camp.
Registration of refugees will be done in the camps. Kenya currently hosts nearly 900,000 refugees with an estimated 600,000 at the Dadaab camps while another 100,000 are in Kakuma. “The government cannot simply scapegoat refugees and asylum-seekers en masse for security incidents,” said Achilles.