New York, Jan 24: The United Nations refugee agency is monitoring the border between Chad and Sudan following reports that 18,000 additional Sudanese refugees have crossed into Chad this week to escape fighting in the Darfur region.

The new refugees join some 95,000 other Sudanese who have fled to Chad since early last year after conflict erupted in Darfur, in western Sudan, between the Sudanese government and the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA).
Officials from the UN High Commissioner for Refugees have been registering the new arrivals and providing them with supplies of blankets, jerry cans and food.
A UNHCR spokesman, Kris Janowski, said yesterday the refugees told local agency staff that Sudanese forces attacked 10 villages in Darfur early in the morning Friday last week, burning houses and dynamiting wells. Many people fled immediately and told the UNHCR they fear for their lives if they return to Darfur.
The refugees are scattered along the border in makeshift shelters, although some are reported to have headed further inside Chad.
Last week UNHCR began relocating refugees to newly constructed camps inside Chad to protect them from cross-border raids by Sudanese militias. So far 621 people have been transferred to a camp at Farchana.
Bureau Report