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Ethiopia 2008: View from Addis Ababa
Photo Credit: Refugees International
04/20/2008
Ethiopia, the oldest independent country in Africa, remains committed to offering asylum to refugees arriving on its territory from neighboring countries. Over the past decade, Ethiopia has hosted about 1 million refugees. Fortunately, over time most of them have been able to repatriate to their respective countries. At the present, Ethiopia is home to approximately 80,000 refugees, mostly from Eritrea, Somalia, Sudan, and Kenya. More than a quarter of the refugees, or about 23,500 individuals, are from Eritrea. Over 1,700 Eritrean refugees were registered in the first quarter of 2008.
Recently arrived Eritrean refugees who have relatives or can afford education in Addis Ababa and other urban areas have been permitted to reside outside of camps to help relieve overcrowding. Other refugees filter south on their own and live as self-supporting urban refugees, but they want urban refugee status.
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