VZCZCXRO3602
RR RUEHMA RUEHPA
DE RUEHBP #0648/01 1920900
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 100900Z JUL 08
FM AMEMBASSY BAMAKO
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 9423
INFO RUEHZK/ECOWAS COLLECTIVE
RUEHAS/AMEMBASSY ALGIERS 0462
RHMFIUU/COMSOCEUR VAIHINGEN GE
RHMFISS/HQ USAFRICOM STUTTGART GE
RHMFISS/HQ USEUCOM VAIHINGEN GE

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 BAMAKO 000648 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: ASEC PINS PINR ML
SUBJECT: UNHCR REPORT FINDS TUAREG REFUGEES NOT REFUGEES 
 
REF: A. OUAGADOUGOU 00448 
     ¶B. BAMAKO 00507 
     ¶C. NOUAKCHOTT 00305 
     ¶D. BAMAKO 00435 
     ¶E. BAMAKO 00610 
 
1.(SBU)  Summary:  The UN High Commission for Refugees 
(UNHCR) office in Bamako recently shared with the Embassy an 
internal UNHCR assessment of claims by Malian Tuaregs who 
ostensibly crossed into neighboring Burkina Faso to flee 
fighting in northern Mali.  The arrival of roughly 1000 
Malian Tuaregs in Burkina Faso in May 2008 - and the decision 
to set up a camp for about 300 of these individuals at a 
football stadium in Ouagadougou - received a considerable 
amount of international press coverage and upset Malian 
officials who maintained that there was no reason for Tuaregs 
to flee northern Mali (Ref. A).  According to the report, 
only 11 of the 300 Tuaregs housed at the football stadium in 
Ouagadougou are from the region of Kidal.  UNHCR concluded 
that the rest of the Malian Tuaregs camped in Ouaga and Djibo 
did not meet refugee criteria.  UNHCR found that many of 
these Tuaregs were either already living in Burkina, hailed 
from Bamako or Niger, or were of a certain "non-civilian" 
status.  The report also strongly criticized Burkina Faso's 
National Refugee Commission (CONAREF), the Government of 
Burkina Faso and the international media, thereby raising 
perhaps more questions than it answered.  End Summary. 
 
2.(U)  On July 6 the Embassy received a copy of an internal 
June 13 UNHCR assessment of Malian Tuareg refugees seeking 
asylum in neighboring Burkina Faso.  The UNHCR office in 
Bamako communicated the report to the Malian Ministry of 
Territorial Administration on June 23.  The assessment was 
conducted by UN officials based in Senegal, Benin, Togo and 
Mali and included representatives from UNICEF, the UN Office 
for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), the UN 
Populations Fund, the World Food Program (WFP) and Burkina's 
National Institute for Statistics.  The assessment team 
interviewed Tuareg populations claiming refugee status in 
Ouagadougou and Djibo. 
 
3.(U)  UNHCR provided assistance to approximately 600 
individuals in May after receiving a formal request for help 
from the Burkina government.  According to the UNHCR report, 
"this was done with the clear understanding that the 
provision of assistance to members of this group was given on 
a purely humanitarian basis pending a thorough evaluation of 
the situation on the ground in the country of origin and in 
Burkina Faso."  UNHCR subsequently dispatched two assessment 
teams - one to Burkina and a second to Mali "to collect 
country of origin information."  The report states that 
limited results from the assessment visits to Burkina and 
Mali, combined with "the growing media coverage of the 
legitimate interest of the UN Country Team situation 
commanded setting up an interagency mission, with the WFP, 
UNICEF, OCHA joining UNHCR teams from Cotonou and Dakar to 
evaluation the situation in Ouaga and Djibo." 
 
4.(U)  The UN interagency mission concluded that "the 
discrepancy between the reasons which allegedly prompted the 
flight of members of this group of asylum seekers and the 
facts as recorded" cast "serious doubts on the motivations 
behind such a movement" of supposed Malian Tuareg refugees. 
In support of this conclusion, the evaluation team 
highlighted "the presence amongst members of this group of 
Touaregs who have been living in Ouaga for months, even years 
and who joined this group, attracted by the prospects of 
material assistance.  Some families who were leading a normal 
life in rented houses in Ouaga, opted to join the group in 
the stadium, induced by the security of life in a camp 
established (by) CONAREF and where their needs would be cared 
for." 
 
5.(U)  The evaluators also documented the presence of Tuaregs 
from Niger and Bamako.  "While the latter," said the report 
in reference to Tuaregs from Bamako, "is difficult to 
understand, the former is worrisome as it points to a 
possible alliance between the MNJ of Niger and the Touareg 
rebels in Mali."  The UNHCR team also drew attention to some 
individuals with a "non-civilian profile."  The report said 
the presence of these individuals within the group of asylum 
seekers called for "extreme caution." 
 
6.(U)  No more than 10 to 15 individuals claimed to be from 
the northern Malian region of Kidal, roughly 800 km from the 
Mali-Burkina frontier.  The UNHCR report speculated that 
these individuals, along with some Malian Tuaregs originating 
in the Gao region closer to the Burkina border, may have 
 
BAMAKO 00000648  002 OF 002 
 
 
traveled to Burkina to flee sporadic fighting, poor economic 
prospects, soaring food prices or any combination of the 
three. 
 
7.(U)  The report sharply criticized the Burkina Faso 
National Refugee Commission (CONAREF), concluding that "the 
precipitation with which the CONAREF has acted and the 
prospects of new life have significantly contributed to 
amplify the original situation."  The report also faulted 
decisions by the international media and Burkina government. 
"Equally of concern," said the report, "is the Media 
coverage, a hammering worthy of a humanitarian emergency, 
encouraged by the authorities which induced more people to 
cross the border.  Hundreds of families are waiting at the 
border (for) the establishment of a camp.  The visit of three 
ministers to the stadium where 300 people are located has 
conferred to the operation a much higher profile than 
required; A special appeal to the international community for 
assistance was even made publicly by the MFA." 
 
8.(U)  The UNHCR assessment team found the "insistence" of 
Burkinabe authorities to set up a refugee camp in Ouaga 
"operationally hard to justify," but speculated that this 
insistence "may be explained by the security concerns" posed 
by the "uncontrolled presence" of Malian Tuaregs.  The team 
concluded that while follow up with the 10-15 individuals 
from Kidal is warranted, "a fully fledged assistance program 
through a camp based structure is operationally inappropriate 
under the present circumstances and legally difficult to 
reconcile with refugee criteria." 
 
9.(U)  Comment:  Few Malians believed that the Tuaregs camped 
in Burkina hailed from the region of Kidal, particularly 
after radio interviews with some of the individuals betrayed 
accents more in line with Tuareg populations located in the 
region of Gao along the Mali-Burkina border.  However, 
international press reports of an exodus of Tuareg civilians 
fleeing fighting in the north put a considerable amount of 
pressure on the Malian government and elevated, however 
briefly, an internal conflict between the Malian military and 
Tuareg rebel/bandits to the level of an international 
humanitarian crisis (Ref. B). 
 
10.(SBU) Comment continued:  In some respects, the UNHCR 
assessment raises more questions than it resolves.  The 
authors' strong words for the Burkinabe Refugee Commission 
and Burkinabe Government seem curious, as does the 
speculation that some "non-civilian" members of the MNJ are 
integrated among the Tuaregs camped in Ouagadougou and Djibo. 
 There is no doubt that some Malian Tuaregs, still cognizant 
of the humanitarian consequences of the 1991-1996 rebellion 
for Malians of Tuareg and Arab decent and eager to avoid 
becoming entrapped by future hostilities, have fled the 
northern regions of Gao and Timbuktu for Burkina and 
Mauritania (Ref. C).  Apart from the 10-15 individuals 
identified by UNHCR in Ouagadougou, most Tuaregs displaced by 
actual fighting in the region of Kidal have either moved to 
remote desert encampments still within the Kidal region or 
across Mali's northern border to southern Algeria (Ref. D). 
It is conceivable that some Bamako-based Tuaregs, fearful of 
the way winds appeared to be blowing earlier this year - 
particularly following the April 10 executions of two Tuaregs 
in Kidal, decided to leave the Malian capital with their 
families for Burkina or elsewhere.  Many Tuaregs left Bamako 
to avoid reprisals during Mali's 1991-1996 rebellion and some 
also left, only to return a short time later, after the May 
2006 attacks by Tuareg rebels on Malian military bases in 
Kidal and Menaka.  It is also possible that some of 
"non-civilian" Malian Tuaregs in Djibo and Ouagadougou who 
hail from the region of Gao were involved, or are relatives 
of those who were involved, in the May 12 attack on the 
Malian gendarme base in Ansongo, which is less than 150 km 
from the Burkina border. 
LEONARD