10/29/2005

The UNHCR estimates that about 3,500 Rwandans will pass through this repatriation center this year. Many decide to come home after hearing radio broadcasts from Rwanda inviting them back. To facilitate return, UNHCR officials visit Congolese cities on market days in an effort to pick up refugees and bring them to the repatriation center, where they sleep in this tent a night or two as they prepare to go home. The FDLR, a Hutu militia group operating in the Democratic Republic of Congo, often tries to prevent refugees from returning by spreading rumors that they will be killed when they get home. Nevertheless, 47,000 Rwandans have returned home since UNHCR opened this center in 2000.