CAIRO: IOM in Morocco is appealing for $800,000 to provide reintegration support to up to 1,000 stranded Sub-Saharan African migrants voluntarily returning home on flights provided by the Moroccan government. The IOM assistance will be provided to the migrants once they arrive home in their countries of origin and will be in the form of support to enable them to start small businesses, or payment for a training course that will provide them with income generating skills. The migrants – mainly from Cameroon, Nigeria, Senegal and Cote D'Ivoire – arrived in Morocco with the intention of going to Europe. But with travel to Europe becoming increasingly difficult for Sub-Saharan migrants, they are now stranded in Morocco with no work or places to live. “Among the migrants are unaccompanied minors, pregnant women, women with infants and those with medical conditions who desperately want to return home," explains Anke Strauss, IOM's Chief of Mission in Morocco. Since 2005 IOM has provided Assisted Voluntary Return and Reintegration (AVRR) to 3,500 vulnerable migrants in Morocco through a series of projects, the last of which was funded by the Switzerland and Belgium. Funding for the projects ended in June 2012.
