The Angola Field Group invites you to: ‘UNHCR in Angola, past achievements and current challenges‘, at the Viking Club, Thursday, November 26, 8:00 PM.  The UNHCR – the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, has been operating in Angola since 1976.  As a leading UN operational humanitarian agency, it has assisted Angola to meet the challenges of mass displacement, emergency humanitarian situations, the repatriation of hundreds of thousands of refugees, the establishment of a functioning national asylum system, and the need to develop a modern migration management system. Today, UNHCR is also playing its role in the emergency response to the recent mass expulsion of Angolan refugees from the DRC and helping the Government prepare an operational plan to bring home the tens of thousands of Angolan refugees that still remain in the DRC and other neighbouring countries. The presentation will  illustrate the above and how UNHCR works with refugees, asylum seekers and other vulnerable displaced people not only in theory but in practice.

Bohdan Nahajlo has been the UNHCR Representative in Angola since September 2008.  Previously he was UNHCR’s Representative in Azerbaijan and Belarus and worked extensively on forced displacement challenges in the countries of the former Soviet Union.  British born and educated, before he joined UNHCR in 1994 he was a writer and a journalist.  The author of two books and numerous articles and reports, he was a regular contributor to the Spectator, New Statesman and The Times.  He began his professional career after postgraduate studies at the London School of Economics as a Researcher on the USSR for Amnesty International.

Everybody is welcome to attend this presentation. In close cooperation with the Viking Club, this event is offered free of charge. Alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages are sold at the bar, $3.00 each. For sale, books about Angola, in English and just in time for Christmas, Huambo Dolls will be on sale. For a location map of the Viking Club visit our Join Us page. The club is on the main floor of the ‘Predio Maianga’ formerly known as the Swedish Building, at Rua Marien N”Guabi, No 118 in Maianga, across the street from the new Panela de Barra restaurant.

Angolan refugees continue to flee from the DRC. Photo courtesy Yolande Ditewig.