Kenya tells UN it will shut two camps with 410,000 refugees by June 2022
FILE PHOTO: An aerial picture shows a section of the Hagadera camp in Dadaab near the Kenya-Somalia border, May 8, 2015.
Kenyasaid on Thursday it had told the United Nations it willshutbyJune2022twocampsholding over 430,000refugeeswho fled from wars in the East and Horn of Africa, adding it planned to repatriate some and give others residency.
The interior ministry made the announcement on Twitter about five weeks after ordering the closure of the Dadaab and Kakuma refugeecampsand giving the United Nationstwoweeks to present a plan to carry this out.
Kenya's President UhuruKenyatta andU.N. refugee agency (UNHCR) chief Filippo Grandi met on Thursday in Nairobi and a joint team will be formed to finalize and implement a road map toward the closure of thecamps, theUN andKenyan government said in a joint statement on Thursday.
Kenyaand the UNHCR "agree that refugeecampsare not a long-term solution to forced displacement" and are committed to working together to find alternative solutions in line with the Global Compact onRefugees, the statement read.
One of thetworefugeecampsin northernKenya, Dadaab, close to the sensitive border with war-wracked Somalia, was set up in 1991. In 2011, amid famine and chaos in Somalia, it was the world's largest camp.
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Thursday's announcement appeared to be the decisive step byKenyaafter years of discussion about closing Dadaab.
"Among the precursory activities in (the government's) roadmap is repatriation ofrefugeesto countries of origin and socio-economic integration of some of them through Work/Residence Permits (inKenya)," the tweet read.
Legal challenges could follow. Earlier this month, aKenyan court ruled against the closure of thecamps.
Authorities in Nairobi first announced their intention toshutthe Dadaab camp back in 2016, citing national security concerns over infiltration by militants from the Somalia-based Islamist group al Shabaab.
Relations betweenKenyaand Somalia have deteriorated badly in the past year since Mogadishu cut diplomatic ties with Nairobi, accusing it of interfering in its internal affairs.
Kenyacontributes troops to the African Union peacekeeping force deployed in Somalia to curb the al Qaeda-linked al Shabaab that seeks to topple the government. In a sign of the tense relationship, Somalia said in January it had lost confidence inKenyan troops serving in the peacekeeping mission.