Section: IDP Population Figures

Sub-section: Number of IDPs, disaggregated by age and sex where data are available

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Number of IDPs

Nearly eight per cent of CAR’s 4.5 million people are either internally displaced or living as refugees outside the country. As of November, the UN estimated the number of IDPs at over 192,000 and the number of Central African refugees living in Cameroon and Chad at 162,000. CAR also hosts more than 31,000 refugees from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Sudan (OCHA, 14 July 2010).

Armed conflict pitting government forces against various armed groups in northern areas of the Central African Republic (CAR) caused the internal displacement of more than 200,000 people between 2005 and 2008. Following the signing of peace and reconciliation agreements, the number fell to around 108,000, but since 2009 clashes between the army and a splinter rebel group, and attacks against civilians by the Lord’s Resistance Army have caused new displacement.

In its 2008 country report on human rights practices, the US Department of State reported that ongoing insecurity and violence had had a disproportionate effect on children in CAR, who in 2007 accounted for almost 50 per cent of all IDPs (U.S. DOS, 11 March 2008). According to UNHCR, the percentage is even higher in provinces like Ouham and Ouham-Pendé, where 61 per cent of IDPs are children (UNHCR, March 2008).
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