OCHA Situation Report
Eritrea
31 October 2003


Source: UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA)

HIGHLIGHTS

On Friday, 24 October, UN staff along with representatives of the
Government of Eritrea and members of the diplomatic corps celebrated
United Nations Day at the UN compound.  A minute of silence was observed
in memory of the recent victims of the 19 August bombing in Iraq. The
Resident/Humanitarian Coordinator, Mr. Simon Nhongo, the Special
Representative of the Secretary-General (SRSG), Mr. Legwaila Joseph
Legwaila, and a representative of the government of Eritrea addressed the
ceremony. The Resident/Humanitarian Coordinator said the UN, and the rest
of the international community, were "very apprehensive about the recent
slowdown in the peace process between Ethiopia and Eritrea. It is our hope
that UNMEE's commendable efforts in facilitating the peace process will be
duly rewarded sooner rather than later."  He also highlighted the role of
the UN in Eritrea's development, rehabilitation, peace and emergency
interventions. The SRSG said that demarcation would start very soon. "The
full and expeditious demarcation of the border is, without any doubt, the
only insurance for durable peace between Ethiopia and Eritrea." He added
that the primary responsibility for implementing the Algiers Agreements
rested with the governments of the two countries.  "They have done a good
job until very recently, and for this I publicly commend and congratulate
them," he said.

On 17 October, a small bomb exploded in the border town of Tesseney.  It
had been planted on a parked truck close to the fuel station and 500
metres from the UNHCR guesthouse.  There were no casualties but the truck
and another one parked nearby were badly damaged. While neither the
identity nor motive of the attackers were established, increased security
measures were put in place.  The planned repatriation convoy from Sudan
proceeded on Sunday 21 October.  No one has yet claimed responsibility for
the incident.

The US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for African affairs, Mr. Donald
Yamamoto visited Eritrea on Wednesday 22 October.  He had already visited
Ethiopia and Djibouti.  During his stay in Asmara he met with President
Isaias Afwerki.

Eritrea accepted over 50,000 sheep stranded at sea for over two months
from the Australian Government. The sheep were originally bound for Saudi
Arabia but Saudi authorities rejected them for fear of disease.  The
Eritrean Government will be given over US$ 700,000 to cover the costs of
unloading, transporting, vaccinating and slaughtering the sheep. The
Australians will also provide some 3,000 tonnes of fodder.


INTEGRATED RECOVERY PROGRAMME (IRP)

To get IRP underway, a Jump Starting Project funded by UNDP and UNHCR
under the framework component, will provide the first tangible assistance
to war affected population groups in the Gash Barka and Debub regions.  
The IRP targets 3 vulnerable groups, IDPs, returnees and expellees.  Two
hundred expellee women headed households (WHH) in Gerenfit and Gerset and
a further 27 women in Tsorena will be the first direct beneficiaries of
the IRP.  The 427 women have been selected by their communities and will
receive training in various income and employment generating skills and/or
micro credit support.


UNHCR CONTINUES REPATRIATION

Repatriation continues every fourth day from Sudan to Eritrea.  A team
from OCHA visited the border town of Tesseney to witness the second
repatriation convoy of Eritreans from camps in Sudan.  Eleven buses and 30
trucks were involved in transporting the 439 returnees and their
belongings.  UNHCR, along with the Eritrea Relief & Refugee Commission
(ERREC) and Mercy Corps facilitated the returnees by providing basic
necessities such as water, and shelter with WFP providing food. A
well-coordinated team provided medical and social vulnerability
assessments as well as, information and transport. Many of the returnees
had not been back in over 20 years and were looking forward to rebuilding
their lives in their old country.  A vast reintegration operation is
underway involving long term strategies in the areas of health, water and
sanitation, agriculture, education and income generating activities which
will be carried out by different national and international non
governmental organisations (NGOs) including Mercy Corps, Oxfam GB, and
Haben, with the support of the ministries in the Zoba and Sub-Zobas. Two
more convoys arrived on the 23 and 26 October returning a further 394
individuals home.  On Friday 31, another convoy carrying 83 families
crossed the border.  The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Mr.
Ruud Lubbers, is expected to visit Eritrea via Tesseney on 13-14 November
2003.

A Technical Tripartite Meeting between UNHCR (Sudan and Eritrea), and the
Governments of Sudan and Eritrea, represented by the Commissioner of ERREC
and his Sudanese counterpart, Commissioner of Refugees (COR), was held in
Dubai from 23-24 October. This was the first meeting, under the auspices
of the Tripartite Commission on Repatriation of Eritrean Refugees from
Sudan, to be held in over a year.  The tripartite dialogue was interrupted
by the border incidents resulting in the closure of the Sudanese-Eritrean
border in October 2002. The three parties agreed to resume the tripartite
process and to spare no efforts in facilitating the repatriation of up to
25 000 refugees by the end of the year. The parties also agreed to
organise an evaluation "lessons learned" workshop on the repatriation
operation to date.  The workshop date is tentatively set for the first
week of December 2003.


WORLD HEALTH ORGANISATION (WHO) ACTIVITIES

The WHO Eritrea office, in consultation with the Ministry of Health and
partners has developed a three-year Country Cooperation Strategic (CCS)
document for the period 2004-2006. It was presented to partners and donors
in Asmara on 8 October. After incorporating the comments of the
participants it was sent to WHO AFRO for review.  The national measles
mass campaign for children 9 months to 14 years was conducted two weeks
ago. Preliminary results indicate that over a million children were
successfully immunised. The two-week campaign, supported by UNICEF and
WHO, was the first of its kind in Eritrea.  Of the total 1.3 million
children aged between 9 months and 15 years targeted, around 1.05 million
- 82% - of children were vaccinated. While Eritrea's routine measles
vaccination programme has been extremely successful in reducing deaths
from vaccine preventable diseases, the mass campaign is expected to
further strengthen efforts to eliminate measles as a major cause of child
death in Eritrea. The MOH, in collaboration with WHO and UNICEF, is
preparing a post-campaign evaluation which is scheduled to take place in
the first two weeks of November 2003.  WHO sent eight MOH staff from all
the six zones and the centre, as well as, WHO and UNICEF staff to attend a
meeting in Mombasa, Kenya on Reaching Every District (RED) implementation
of immunization. The meeting held from October 27-31 discussed how to
improve access to immunization services at the local level in the Africa
region.

Eritrea was selected by WHO regional office for Africa to be one of the
testing sites for the newly developed Malaria Treatment Algorithm. A
consultant was sent by WHO AFRO to accomplish the mission and finalized
his testing in the last two weeks. Two other consultants are presently
assisting the MOH in evaluating the impacts of malaria case management
trainings provided to date. The WHO has supported the MOH in setting up an
adverse drug reaction monitoring system in Eritrea. A consultant was here
to assist the MOH from 19th to 29th of October.


FAO/WFP CROP AND FOOD ASSESSMENT TEAM

A team of FAO and WFP consultants are carrying out a post harvest
assessment of the national crop and food output for 2003.  They arrived on
26 October and will visit crop-producing areas throughout the country and
have meetings with ministries and key informants up to 12 November 2003.
The experts will debrief Government, donors and members of the UNCT. The
independent report that this mission will produce will be made available
on the FAO website.


HIV/AIDS Update

UNAIDS have launched a new case study entitled "Fighting AIDS - HIV/AIDS
prevention and care among armed forces and UN peacekeepers: The Case of
Eritrea". The launch was held in Nairobi during the 13th International
Conference on AIDS and STIs in Africa (ICASA). The case study highlights
HIV/AIDS prevention and care activities undertaken by UNMEE and the
Eritrea Defence Force. Since 1988 when the first AIDS case was reported in
Assab, the cumulative number of reported AIDS cases in Eritrea rose from 8
in 1988 to 15,698 by December 2002. According to the HIV sero-survey and
behavioural survey conducted in 2001 among five population subgroups in
Eritrea, the HIV sero-prevalence is as follows: secondary school students,
0.1%; general population, 2.4%; military personnel, 4.6%; antenatal clinic
attendees, 2.8% and female bar workers (including SWs), 22.8%.

During its 6th Meeting in Chiang Mai, Thailand, 15-17 October 2003, the
Board of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria approved
$623 million in new two-year grants to programs fighting the three
diseases. The Board approved the HIV/AIDS component of Eritrea's
submission during this 3rd Round (US$ 8,124,910 for the first two years
and US$ 17,354,035 for five years).


CAP FUNDING STATUS and OTHER RESOURCES

The overall funding needs of the CAP were revised from US$ 163,389,457 to
US$ 159,963,824 due to interruption in the repatriation programme and the
delay in demobilization.  The UNCT, Government and other humanitarian
agencies made considerable efforts to achieve the goals articulated in the
Appeal with 62% (US$99,156,866) of the revised requirements resourced
through the CAP.  To further enhance humanitarian interventions, the
Government, UN and other partners included project proposals from four
NGOs in the Mid-Term Review of CAP 2003 and from six NGOs in CAP 2004.
Contributions outside of the CA framework, totalling US$70.5 million, have
been resourced in response to the 2003 national appeal.  This includes
both food and non-food assistance from Eritreans in and outside the
country, the World Bank, NGO and bilateral donations.


MINE ACTION

On 19 October, an Explosive Ordinance Disposal team from the Mine Action
Coordination Centre (UNMACC) was assigned to Tsorena to search and destroy
UXOs from the last war.  Two UXOs and 28 rounds of assorted small arms
ammunition were disposed of by the Bangladeshi Engineering Company along
the road from Kerkasha to Taula Gimuja and along the road from Shilalo to
Badme.


PEACEKEEPING EVALUATION TEAM

A five member Evaluation Mission led by Major-General Timothy Ford from
the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations (DPKO) in New York visited
Eritrea from the 17-19 October.  It is only the third time that the UN has
sent an evaluation team to a peacekeeping mission.  The aim was to explore
what lessons could be learnt and incorporated from existing peacekeeping
operations like UNMEE into future missions.  The team was briefed at UNMEE
headquarters in Asmara and visited three sectors.


Upcoming Events

1. Visit of Mr. Roger Winter, USAID Assistant Administrator for Democracy,
Conflict and Humanitarian Assistance from October 31 to November 2 2003.

2. UN Heads of Agencies monthly meeting 3 November 2003.

3. Consultative meeting between the Government, donors and UN on 5
November 2003.

4. Mission of Special Envoy of Secretary General, Mr. Martti Ahtisaari,
9-12 November

5. Visit of the High Commissioner for Refugees, Mr. Ruud Lubbers 13-14
November

Please contact: OCHA Eritrea Information Office 291 1 151888


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