CYANIKA – A total of 315 Rwandan from refugee camps, in Masisi and Rutsuru in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) were on Thursday returned home, after spending two weeks at Nyakabande transit camp in Uganda.

The refugees crossed to Uganda through Bunagana following the recent insecurity by the FDLR rebels in North Kivu. They fled from the DRC  with hundreds of Congolese nationals.

The group which included some wives of the rebels operating in the DRC comprised of 46 men, 98 women and several children.

The returnees were received by United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) and Ministry of Local Government officials.

They were transported to Nkamira transit camp, in Rubavu district for a screening exercise before handing them essential start up commodities.

In the ensuing repatriation exercise 46 congolese nationals who pretended to be Rwandan refugees were discovered and sent back to the DRC.

"Each family is to be given food rations, household necessities to support them in the first three months of their new life,” said Providance Tumukunde, an official from the Ministry of Local Government.

Narrating their experience in the DRC, the refugees said that women suffered sexual abuse at the hands of FDLR, before they were settled at refugee camps.

"I am grateful that I am finally home, again after years of wondering within Walikare and  Masisi forests, we had no permanent abode,’’ Claudine Uwamahoro, with a child whose father she does not know said.

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