About 2500 Burundian asylum seekers who were grouped in Kamanyola camp in south Kivu, DRC, went to Rwanda since 7 March. Dionyse Nyandwi, their spokesperson says they expect to find a peaceful place to live in. “We were persecuted by our Congolese neighbors and we think that we will live in Rwanda, in conformity with the International Refugees’ law,” he says.
Burundian asylum seekers in Kamanyola camp
Nyandwi says the UN Refugees Agency in Rwanda is carrying out an identification process to shelter them in a transit center. Since they reached Rwanda on 7 March, the spokesperson for the asylum seekers says they had already received the essential products. “We surprised the UN agency when we left the Kamanyola camp on foot except people who were injured from the last incident that happened in September 2017”, he says.
The asylum seekers are now waiting for UN refugees Agency full assistance.
In January, the Office of the High Commissioner for Refugees has suspended food assistance due to the asylum seekers’ refusal of the UN footprinted registration system.
Those asylum seekers are followers of Eusebie Ngendakumana from Burundi, who claims to see vision of the Virgin Mary. They said they fled the religious persecution in 2015. In September 2017, an attack was perpetrated against them and 39 people died.
Officials from the Ministry of Disaster Management and Refugees Affairs-MIDIMAR in Rwanda announced yesterday that more than 2500 Burundian refugees who fled DRC because of insecurity – as they say- are being screened before shifting them to Nyarushishi transit Center. “MIDIMAR, UNHCR and partners supplied food, clean water & established conditions of sanitation and hygiene”, reads the MIDIMAR tweet.
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