S. Sudan refugee commission, UNHCR kick of verification, profiling of asylum seekers, refugees in Juba

JUBA – The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees  and South Sudan Commission of Refugee Affairs have launched a joint verification and profiling of over 6,000 asylum seekers and refugees in Juba.

Dut Akol Kuol, Acting Director-General for Protection and Refugees Welfare at Commission for Refugees Affairs said the exercise seeks to validate and update the registry of asylum seekers and refugees in the country.

“We are aiming to 6,000 refugees in Juba and they are urban refugees. They came from many countries in the region, for example from Eritrea, Ethiopia, DR Congo, Sudan especially from Southern Blue Nile and Southern Kordofan and they staying here as urban refugees,” Kuol told Dawn reporter in an exclusive interview on Monday in Juba.

Kuol disclosed that the verification will run for 4 to 6 weeks with an additional one month as a grace period for those who are not within Juba.

He added said the after the verification, they will provide them with new identification documents and ration cards.

“The verification is to see refugees physically. You must come with your family and with your documents which are the ration card and everybody from the family must be there. Once you are verified, you will be given a new ration card,” he said.

Becky Ondoa Alimas, Protection Associate Community-Based at UN Refugee Agency, said the survey is designed to gather information about their reasons for leaving the countries of origin.

“The other nationalities that are here will have to go through Refugee Status Determination (RSD) to determine the reasons why they are running whether it is true or false,” Ondoa said.

Ondoa added, “It is a period and it required a lot of questions and answers sessions in order to justify their cause and reasons for coming here.”

She said the exercise will help you UN Refugees Agency and Commission for Refugees to design protection programs.

“The exercise will help us to determine if we still have the same figure or we have much less and this exercise will also help CRA and UNHCR in designing programs intervention for their protection while they are here,” she said.