100,000 Bhutanese refugees have left camps to restart new lives: UN
Xinhua, November 24, 2015 Adjust font size:
The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) announced that in the past eight years, 100,000 Bhutanese refugees have moved from camps in eastern Nepal to eight countries to start new lives, a UN spokesman said Monday.
Australia, Canada, Denmark, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Norway and the United Kingdom joined the United States in welcoming the refugees, many of whom had spent nearly 20 years in the camps, hoping to one day return to Bhutan, UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said at a daily news briefing here.
UN High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres and IOM Director General William Lacy Swing welcomed the close cooperation between their agencies, the Nepalese government and the resettlement countries that made it happen, he said.
In a statement issued last week, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon underscored his growing concern over the blocking of essential supplies on the Nepal-India border.
Ban said he was alarmed by reports of the obstruction and destruction of life-saving medical supplies and the continued impact on humanitarian operations.
He called on all sides to lift these restrictions without further delay and underlined Nepal's right of free transit. Enditem