Somalia hosts over 38,600 refugees, asylum-seekers: UNHCR

By: XINHUA

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said on Thursday that Somalia is hosting 38,642 registered refugees and asylum-seekers as of February.

About 67 percent of them are women and children, 30 percent are school-age children (6-17 years), and 26 percent are women and girls of reproductive age (13-49 years), the UNHCR said in its latest update released in Mogadishu, the capital of Somalia.

“The majority of refugees and asylum-seekers, or 66 percent, are from Ethiopia, followed by Yemen (29 percent), Syria (4 percent), and other countries (1 percent),” it said.

According to the UNHCR, most of the refugees and asylum-seekers reside in urban or peri-urban settings across the Woqooyi Galbeed and Bari regions in northern Somalia.

It said 9,046 former refugees have returned to Somalia from their countries of asylum, mostly from Yemen, followed by Kenya, since January 2020.

“From the total number of refugee returnees, 3,652 individuals have been directly assisted by UNHCR, mainly through the voluntary repatriation program from Kenya and the assisted spontaneous returns program from Yemen,” the UNHCR said.

The UN agency said 68 Somali refugees have returned to Somalia in 2024.

It added that more than 800,000 Somali refugees and asylum-seekers are also hosted in neighboring countries and a further 3.9 million persons are internally displaced inside Somalia due to conflict and natural disasters. ■