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Emergency airlift of 16,100 tents from Pakistan to Chad

July 22, 2004

KARACHI, 22 July (UNHCR) - Aircraft chartered by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees are leaving this week with the last of 16,100 tents needed to shelter refugees in Chad who have fled conflict in the neighbouring Darfur area of Sudan.

The final flight of 21 that have taken off since 29 June, each carrying 767 Pakistani-made tents, is expected to leave by the end of the week. A flight on Wednesday evening brought the total number of tents dispatched by then to 13,806, with three flights by the chartered IL-76 freight plane still to go. The flights with 46 tonnes of tents land at Ndjamena airport in Chad, where UNHCR staff are trying to relocate refugees arriving from Sudan into safer locations further from the border. The emergency airlift as conditions in Chad worsen, follows the shipment of 7,000 other tents to Chad from Karachi in early June, part of a worldwide movement of emergency supplies by the UN Refugee Agency for refugees fleeing Sudan. Additional tents were moved from Pakistan early this year.

A UNHCR-rented truck stuck in a flooded river bed between Bahai and Tine in north-eastern Chad. It was eventually pulled out but was delayed by more than six hours. © UNHCR/H.Caux

UNHCR has frequently bought tents for emergencies from manufacturers in Pakistan, with contracts awarded on the basis of competitive bidding. In addition to its role as a source of materials used worldwide for refugees, Pakistan has hosted millions of Afghan refugees in the decades since they first fled war in Afghanistan in 1979.

UN officials have termed the current situation in Sudan and Chad the "world's worst humanitarian emergency". Arab paramilitary groups are accused of attacking black African communities, triggering displacement throughout the vast Darfur region of western Sudan.

In all, more than 140,000 Sudanese refugees are now in UNHCR's camps in eastern Chad. Another 40,000 are still encamped at the border after fleeing the conflict in Sudan's Darfur region since last year.

But rains and flooded riverbeds are impeding UNHCR's work in north-eastern Chad as the agency rushes to relocate Sudanese refugees from the border to inland camps.

More than 6,400 refugees have been relocated in the last week on UNHCR convoys from Bahai region in the north to Oure Cassoni, where they can receive shelter and regular assistance.

Before the transfer started, there were an estimated 15,000 refugees at Bahai and 11,000 at Cariari further north. Because of the flooding, UNHCR and the World Food Programme are exploring ways to bring assistance to the refugees in this area by alternative routes from Libya and northern Chad.