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The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) revealed Tuesday that the number of Ethiopian refugees fleeing to neighboring Sudan surpassed 41,193 amid ongoing fighting between the Ethiopian National Defense Force (ENDF) and forces loyal to the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), which governs the regional state of Tigray.
“As of November 23, 41,193 Ethiopians had crossed into eastern Sudan,” the UN Refugee Agency said in its status report issued Tuesday.
UNHCR said the rate of newcomers that had averaged 4,000 a day dropped to just 2,000 a day on November 19 and 20.
“However, over the weekend, rates increased again with 3,111 arrivals on Saturday and 1,640 on Sunday,” he added.
According to UNHCR, the majority continue to cross through the Hamdayet border point (27,533) in Kassala state, the Lugdi border point and the Abderaf border point in Gederaf state (12,042).
He also claimed that no new arrivals are being reported in Blue Nile state, which is home to 702 refugees.
“Remote border areas are still heavily congested with poor living conditions in general despite the help provided,” he added.
The agency also said that as of Monday, 8,329 people have been relocated to Um-Rakuba over the course of the week on a trip that takes a full day by bus.
He also said that the evaluation of the new Tenetba site at Fau 5 is ongoing. Plans are being made to relocate 60 Eritrean refugees who arrived with the Ethiopian population in the Shagarab refugee camp.
UNHCR and protection partners are increasing their protection monitoring on the ground.
According to UNHCR, many refugees have been reluctant to leave border points, some because they are still searching for missing relatives.
The Sudanese Red Crescent Society (SRCS), together with the ICRC, are establishing a mechanism to locate relatives.
Meanwhile, the Ethiopian government has vowed to rehabilitate recently displaced citizens in neighboring Sudan amid ongoing fighting in the restless northern regional state of Tigray.
Since the early hours of November 4, the Ethiopian government has been conducting military operations against the TPLF, which rules Ethiopia’s northernmost regional state of Tigray.
The federal government operation followed the TPLF attack on the northern command base of the Ethiopian Defense Force, a division stationed in the region for more than two decades and based in the city of Mekelle, capital of the region of Tigray.
Growing disputes between the federal government and the TPLF were exacerbated in September this year when the Tigray regional government decided to go ahead with its planned regional elections, which the Ethiopian parliament had previously postponed due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
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