Angelina Jolie has visited a refugee camp in Burkina Faso.
Gatekeepers News reports that Oscar-winning actor Angelina Jolie has paid a visit to a refugee camp in Burkina Faso. The camp shelters thousands of Malians who have fled jihadist violence in the region.
Jolie, as part of her role as an ambassador for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), visited the camp at Goudebou, in the northeast of the landlocked west African country.
Jolie who was accompanied by Burkina Faso’s Foreign Minister Alpha Barry arrived by helicopter for a ceremony to mark World Refugee Day.
She said, “I have marked this day every year for 20 years with refugees in different countries.
“I have never been as worried about the state of displacement globally as I am today.
“The truth is we are not doing half of what we could and should to find solutions to enable refugees to return home — or to support host countries, like Burkina Faso, coping for years with a fraction of the humanitarian aid needed to provide basic support and protection.”
An attack on the camp last year March forced some 9,000 refugees sheltering there to flee — and caused its de facto closure.
Having stepped up security at the camp, the Burkinabe authorities and the UNHCR have been relocating the refugees there since December.
More soldiers have been posted at a new barracks and patrols have also increased there now.
According to the UNHCR, nearly 11,000 people from towns in Burkina Faso’s north have returned to Goudebou between December and July.
The representative for the Goudebou refugees, Wanadine ag Mohamed said, “The refugees are battered because the security situation is deteriorating day by day despite the efforts by the Burkinabe authorities, their partners, and the defence and security forces in the Sahel region.”
Mohamed pointed to the June 4-5 attack on the northeast village of Solhan where Burkinabe authorities reported that gunmen killed at least 132 people.
Since 2012, around 22,000 refugees of various nationalities including many Malians fleeing the abuses of jihadist groups in northern and central Mali found refuge in Burkina Faso.
However, Burkina has in turn become the target of attacks by Al-Qaeda- and Islamic State-linked jihadists since 2015 which have left more than 1,400 dead and forced a million to flee their homes.
