Thousands Sudanese are fleeing into the forest near Ethiopia’s border after surviving from local militias attacks on and runs to the United Nations-run refugee camps.
The refugees fled in May after gunmen and bandits repeatedly stormed the camps to steal supplies, raped women, kidnaped people for ransom and made civilians terrified.
Refugees who spoke to Al Jazeera said that at least 7,000 people left the camps and some 3,000 are still in the forest where they live alongside “wild animals” like hyenas, scorpions and snakes. The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has said about 1,000 people left the camps.
“We want to get out of the borderlands of Ethiopia and we want to leave Ethiopia altogether,” said Montasser, a community leader among the Sudanese refugees in the forest. We refuse to be put in any other camp here in Ethiopia.”
Sudan is the world’s largest displacement crisis – more than 10 million people have fled since a power struggle between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) erupted into war in April 2023.
More than 53,000 people came to Ethiopia, and about 8,500 of them were settled in UN-administered camps at Awlala and Kumer in the Amhara region. Ethiopian government forces are fighting the Fano armed group in Amhara, with the refugee camps in the heart of the conflict and the refugees saying the camps are attacked often by “bandits and militias”.
Ibrahim, a refugee, told Al Jazeera that bandits raid the camps “three or four times a week” to rob and beat refugees. He has called for relief groups and the UNHCR to relocate Sudanese refugees from Ethiopia. Between December and January, at least four women and girls were reportedly raped by armed groups.
Ibrahim, 27, said that he was robbed at gunpoint around the same time. “He was carrying a Kalashnikov and stole my phone. These kinds of scenes are normal here as almost all Ethiopian citizens are carrying weapons around us,” Ibrahim said.
ZH
