Refugees want to return home

Refugees want to return home

Apriadi Gunawan, The Jakarta Post, Medan, North Sumatra

Some 2,000 Acehnese refugees now being sheltered in a number
of camps in Langkat, North Sumatra, have expressed their
willingness to return to their homes despite poor security
conditions in the strife-torn province.

The refugees left their homes more than eight months ago due
to either intimidation by members of the separatist Free Aceh
Movement (GAM) or due to the armed conflict between GAM and the
military and police personnel. They demanded that the government
compensate them for their belongings lost during and after their
escape from the conflict area.

Refugees who are married are willing to return to their
homelands in the East Aceh regency, while those who are still
single have opted to resettle under the government-sponsored
transmigration program.

Suryadi Awal, coordinator of what he called the Acehnese
Refugees in North Sumatra (ARSINS), said that based on their
rough calculation each family suffered between Rp 30 million
(US$2,858) and Rp 40 million in losses due to losing their
belongings and in the conflict.

The 2,000 refugees, according to Suryadi, should have returned
to their home villages last July, "but their departure was
canceled due to the worsening security situation in the
province."

The East Aceh regency administration in July prepared a safe
transit area for the refugees in Kejuruan Muda, Kuala Simpang
district. The administration later canceled the plan due to the
worsening situation in the area and moved the transit place to
Pulau Tiga village in neighboring Tamiang Hulu district. "But
Regent Azman Usmanuddin also canceled the second plan because of
the poor security in the area," Suryadi added.

"We are still waiting for the regent to fulfill his promise
to enable the refugees to return. They want to return soon. They
cannot stand living in camps any longer," Suryadi told The
Jakarta Post.

Refugee camps in Langkat regency, the closest area in North
Sumatra to its restive neighbor, are sheltering more than 30,000
refugees. The majority come from the East Aceh, West Aceh and
North Aceh regencies. Most refugees fled to North Sumatra between
September 1999 and June 2001.

Bachtiar Usman, a 50-year-old refugee from Birin Bayeun, East
Aceh, said he could no longer stand living in the refugee camp.
"I am worried I will be trapped further into doing things in
violation of the law to earn money for my family."

"We may be forced to become robbers to make ends meet," he
said, adding that the government should have persuaded them to
return to their home villages.

Meanwhile, chief of the North Sumatra provincial social
affairs office, Sofyan Nasution, welcomed the refugees' wish to
return to their home villages.

"We will ask them to register themselves with the social
affairs office, so that we can arrange their return," he told the
Post.