Nduta : More than 70 Burundian refugees detained in Kibondo district dungeons

More than 70 Burundian refugees are detained in the dungeons of Kibondo district in northwestern Tanzania. All are occupants of the Nduta camp set up in this district. These refugees were arrested within a period of one month as announced on Monday by Michael Komwe, head of the police in Kibondo. INFO SOS Médias Burundi

According to the Tanzanian police officer, some of these refugees are suspected of having disrupted security in the villages surrounding the Nduta camp.

“There are others who are involved in banditry acts, others in domestic violence at a time when quite a few other detainees were arrested outside the camp for having gone out without authorization,” Michael Komwe told the local press on Monday in a press briefing.

The police chief in Kibondo said the Burundian refugees in detention were apprehended in search operations targeting “troublemakers” in and around the camp. The detainees are all under the age of 45, the police chief in Kibondo district clarified.

“There are 70 men. Only 3 women are part of the group,” he said.

According to the police, the 73 Burundian refugees detained in Kibondo will be brought before the district Court very soon for trial.

Tanzanian police say at least 95 refugees are detained each year for various offences. According to Burundian refugees in Nduta and Nyarugusu camps, hundreds of refugees have been arrested and sent to cells in the Kigoma region where the two sites are located, in recent years.

“Some of them have never been found. Several women have not been informed of the place of detention of their husbands for a long time. We have learned that there are Burundian refugees who have been killed by Tanzanian security services in collaboration with Burundian intelligence. But Tanzanian authorities do not want to admit it,” lament women from the Nduta camp.

Tanzanian authorities, starting with President Samia Suluhu Hassan, announced earlier this year that all Burundian refugees will have to be repatriated by December 2024.

Since then, all actions taken by Tanzanian authorities have been interpreted by Burundian refugees as “coercive measures to push us into forced repatriation”.