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SUDAN: 1 DEAD IN UN’S COMPOUND ATTACK March 17, 2006
Apunyu Bonny
(SomaliNet) At least one person was killed and two others critically wounded when gunmen attacked a compound of the U.N. refugee agency in southern Sudan. U.N. officials said Thursday. AP reports
The High Commissioner for Refugees spokeswoman Helene Caux said that the Wednesday night raid in the town of Yei has delayed the first repatriation of civil war refugees to that part of southern Sudan. Mean while, the repatriation from the Congo was to have started next week.
"Because of this incident, the repatriation is now on hold," Caux said.
Amidst the attack, one of the gunmen was killed and the other was captured, the UNHCR told The Associated Press from its headquarters in Geneva. Mean while, the gunmen, who broke into the compound, killed one of its Sudanese guards and critically wounded an Iraqi UNCHR staffer and another local guard in what appears to have been an attempted looting, Caux said.
The UNHCR mission in Yei is part of an operation to enable 350,000 refugees to return to southern Sudan from neighboring countries in the wake of the January 2005 peace treaty that concluded a 20-year civil war.