Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) emphasized the need to address the land and property issues for IDPs, when the Norwegian Minister of Finance visited East-Timor Sunday.
NRC also stressed that the need for dialogue and security are not being addressed. According to NRC, solutions without dialogue, reconciliation and properly addressing the land issues, will only facilitate the few and also these will be in a very fragile situation. 100 000 persons, ten percent of the population, are still internally displaced more than one and a half year after the riots in April and May 2006.
- We wanted the Minister to see with her own eyes how the people are suffering. People lack essential items like food and medicines and the overall humanitarian situation is critical, NRC Country Director Alfredo Zamudio says.
NRC took the Minister of Finance, Mrs Kristin Halvorsen, to the Dili National Hospital, where about 400 IDP families are living in very poor sanitary conditions. This is seriously affecting the normal functioning of the most important medical facility in one of the poorest countries in the world. Children are dying of diseases and infections, which in other countries are easily cured and attended.
Mrs Halvorsen walked through the most affected area of the camp, meeting displaced children and women. She was encouraged by the IDP representative, to intervene on their behalf and ask the Timorese government to solve their situation.
Thereafter, Mrs Halvorsen visited a transitional site, built by NRC and funded by the Norwegian government. Here, 156 families are living in more human conditions. So far, NRC has built 432 transitional houses in East-Timor since November last year.
- The new government of East-Timor is disregarding the need for transitional shelter. They are now implementing a new policy based on a compensation in cash. This will be paid out according to the level of damage of the houses which were destroyed or damaged during the violence of last year, when almost 6 000 houses in Dili were burnt, Zamudio says.
NRC has been active in Timor Leste since 2006, providing protection and humanitarian assistance to internally displaced persons.
[ Any views expressed in this article are those of the writer and not of Reuters. ]
