Geneva, 25 November 2019
More than 100 vulnerable refugees including several babies born in detention centres in Libya, have arrived in Rwanda aboard a humanitarian evacuation flight laid on by the United Nations refugee agency.
The group of 116 refugees arrived at Kigali International Airport and taken to a transit facility in Gashora, where UNHCR is providing them with vital assistance, including food, water, medical care, psycho-social support, and accommodation.
“As violence in Tripoli intensifies, these evacuations have never been more urgent”, said Vincent Cochetel, UNHCR Special Envoy for the Central Mediterranean. “But with thousands of refugees still at risk in detention centres and urban areas in Libya, we need States to help us get more refugees out of the country much more quickly.”
The refugees are mainly from Eritrea and some are from Somalia, Ethiopia, Sudan and South Sudan. Around two-thirds of the group are minors under 18 years old, most of whom are travelling along.
Among the group are two one month-old babies, UNHCR said.
All the refugees have been given asylum-seeker status while their cases are assessed and further solutions are pursued, including resettlement, voluntary return to countries of previous asylum, voluntary return to countries of origin where safe to do so and local integration in Rwanda
Around a quarter of the group were evacuated via the UN's Gathering and Departure Facility in Tripoli. Others were evacuated directly from detention centres and urban areas, according to UNHCR.
Due to the limited number of available evacuation and resettlement places, efforts are made to prioritise those most in need, often including unaccompanied children, survivors of torture and other abuses, and people in need of medical treatment.
Several more humanitarian flights out of Libya are planned during the next few weeks, the UN agency said without giving further details.
UNHCR said the airlifts received support of from the Libyan, Rwandan and Nigerien authorities, and from the African Union and welcomed a recent US$10 million donation from the European Union.
UNHCR has assisted 2,141 refugees and asylum seekers leave Libya this year including the resettlement of 723 individuals.
Around 4,500 refugees and asylum seekers continue to be held in detention centres in Libya, including people newly-detained after being rescued or intercepted at sea by Libyan coastguard.
Like other vulnerable refugees living in urban areas, these people remain at risk of being caught up in the ongoing warfare in Libya or being subjected to "horrific forms of harm in the hands of smugglers and traffickers in Libya," UNHCR warned.
"We continue to call for the end of detention of refugees and migrants in Libya as well as more places and faster, more flexible processes to move more refugees away from danger," UNHCR stated.
