Refugees and Displaced People in Africa

The term "displaced people" when speaking of Africa refers to the people who have left or fled their homes to escape armed conflict and violence. The refugee's of Africa are those people who have crossed an international border. Recently, Africa has been known for its large scale refugee movements, its international population displacements and mass repatriation movements. Africans only constitute about 12 percent of the global population, and with the worlds 11.5 million refugees, 28 percent of them and 50 percent of the worlds 20 million displaced persons can be found in Africa. There are 25 African states with refugee populations of about 10,000, with 11 of those populations holding populations of 100,000 or more. In 1994, 47 percent of the refugees that were recorded by the UNHCR were found in Africa. By the time of 1998, refugee numbers dropped significantly to 28 percent, this falling from 6.75 million refugees in 1994 to 3.2 million by 1998.
Refugee Camps & Threats:
The refugee camps all through the continent of Africa are very dangerous and unsanitary. Refugee populated areas could be a target for military attacks which can be in the form of arial bombing, but more likely land based attack. In the 1970's and 80's, there were several attacks and raids launched by South Africa's armed forces, which were targetted towards the refugees in the front line states. Moving on to the 1990s, the problem became widespread and global with such occurances like attacks on Sudanese refugee settlements in Northern Uganda, and the assaults on the Rwandan camps in Eastern Zaire during the end of 1996.
Other than military threats, refugee camps are also targetted for non-military threats, instead involving different types of extreme violence, intimidation and criminal activity. Other threats could include rape and armed robbery.
Here you will find the UNHCR (The UN Refugee Agency) convention on the aspects of refugee issues in Africa.
The UNHCR show clearly in this convention statement that they want to improve the lives of the refugees in Africa, even knowing that they may have been the cause of conflict in the past. The thing that I love the most about the UN is that they try to look past the bad and find the good in what they can do to make the world a better place. One of my favourite statements from this convention is
" Bearing in mind that the Charter of the United Nations and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights have affirmed the principle that human beings shall enjoy fundamental rights and freedoms without discrimination. "
It is good to point out that although the refugees live in some of the poorest conditions,and there has been a great deal of conflict all through the continent because of them, that you should not judge before you know. That some refugees are trying to find the peace and be in a better, safer place than they were before. If there is some way that we can eliminate conflict while making the refugees even a little at peace, in good conditions and completely safe that would be ideal, but we know these things take time. There will always be reasons in Africa to flee, there are too many countries and conflicts to deny that, but the refugees atleast deserve better camps and places to make their home while they can.

A refugee camp in Chad, Africa.

In this video you can see the conditions in which most of the refugees live, and the troubles they may have.