UNHCR seeks $210m for refugees from Central African Republic

The UN refugee agency and its partners today appealed for greater donor support to cope with the continuing outflow and deteriorating condition of refugees from the Central African Republic, the UN refugee agency reported.
On Tuesday UNHCR together with 16 other humanitarian agencies revised the Regional Refugee Response Plan for the CAR situation, seeking US$210 million to assist the growing refugee numbers in four asylum countries – Cameroon, Chad, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Republic of Congo – until the end of the year.
The new appeal figure is lower than the initial $274 million sought in April due to fewer-than-projected refugee arrivals in the DRC and the exclusion of returnees in Chad covered in the first appeal. However the needs have grown in Cameroon, where the majority of refugees are arriving, with $111 million requested in the revised plan – almost double what was initially requested. Less than one-third of the revised plan has been funded so far.
More than 357,000 people have fled CAR for the four host countries since the crisis started in December 2012. This number includes some 160,000 people who left after clashes intensified between the Seleka alliance and anti-Balaka militia in December 2013. Of those who fled in the last seven months – the majority of them Muslims – over 118,000 are in Cameroon, 17,500 in Chad, over 15,000 in the DRC and 9,000 in the Republic of Congo.