No image available
/ 7 February 2008
Human rights issues concerning refugees, immigrants and exiles needed urgent discussion and action at all three levels of government, experts said on Thursday during a panel discussion at the University of the Witwatersrand. The discussion dealt with the Central Methodist Church raid in Johannesburg as well as the country’s immigration policy.
No image available
/ 7 February 2008
United Nations goodwill ambassador and Hollywood megastar Angelina Jolie visited Iraq on a humanitarian mission on Thursday and met top officials to demand help for people displaced by the war. "There are over two million displaced people and there never seems to be a real coherent plan to help them," she said.
No image available
/ 6 February 2008
Many Zimbabwean refugees seek shelter at the Central Methodist church in Johannesburg’s CBD, sleeping on stairs and in passageways in the only place they can find free accommodation. Up to 1 500 refugees living on the church premises were arrested in a late-night raid last week to round up illegal immigrants.
No image available
/ 5 February 2008
The police raid on the Johannesburg Central Methodist Church will affect the mental and physical health of Zimbabwean migrants, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) said on Tuesday. ”Some [refugees] had suspected fractured ribs and possible lung contusions after receiving blows,” MSF said in a statement.
No image available
/ 3 February 2008
There are serious legal concerns over the treatment of immigrants who were arrested this week at the Central Methodist church in the Johannesburg CBD, the Legal Resource Centre said on Saturday. Detainees were apparently delayed in receiving medical and legal assistance and were allegedly asked for bribes by police.
No image available
/ 31 January 2008
Central Methodist Church Bishop Paul Verryn has condemned the heavy-handed way in which police arrested up to 1Â 500 refugees housed at his church in the Johannesburg CBD. The arrests were made during a late-night raid on Wednesday. The church is seen as a sanctuary for Zimbabwean refugees.
No image available
/ 14 December 2007
The rebels whirred up a cloud of orange dust in the stifling heat when they came to meet their victims at Koch Goma Camp in northern Uganda. They had come to plead for forgiveness. But now the dust has settled, and the 17 500-member camp is questioning the sincerity of November’s visit by the Lord’s Resistance Army.
No image available
/ 26 November 2007
Kenya has offered asylum to nearly two dozen Somali refugees, yielding to opposition to its plans to deport them to violence-torn Mogadishu, officials said on Monday. A military truck transported the 22 refugees from Nairobi to Kenya’s north-eastern Dadaab refugee camp on Saturday after the government dropped plans to deport them.
No image available
/ 19 November 2007
It was after the second beating by Ethiopian soldiers that Abdi Bashi Jama says he decided to head for the border. But though separated from family, far from his home village in Ethiopia’s eastern Ogaden region, and a refugee rather than a shop-owner now, Jama considers himself lucky.
No image available
/ 13 November 2007
Thousands of refugees poured out of camps in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo’s violent North Kivu province on Tuesday after the army said Tutsi-dominated insurgents attacked its positions. Army troops repelled the dawn raid on their positions near Mugunga camp, killing 27 fighters loyal to renegade General Laurent Nkunda.