U.S. prepares to resettle Bhutanese refugees

U.S. officials will start interviewing Bhutanese refugees next week to determine which of them can resettle in the United States starting January 2008, the State Department said Saturday.

The U.S. announced last year that it would take as many as 60,000 Bhutanese refugees living in camps in Nepal over the next few years.

About 15,000 will move to the U.S. next year, and 20,000 more each subsequent year, said Ellen Sauerbrey, assistant secretary of State for population, refugees and migration.

“We might see the first planeload arriving around the latter part of January,” she said.

More than 100,000 ethnic Nepalis -- a Hindu minority in Bhutan for centuries -- have been living as refugees in Nepal since the early 1990s, when they were forced out by Bhutanese authorities who wanted to maintain the country’s dominant Buddhist culture.

Though Bhutan, the world’s last Buddhist kingdom, is slowly moving toward democracy, it refuses to allow the refugees to return, contending that most left voluntarily and have renounced their citizenship.

The refugees are living in seven United Nations-run camps in southeast Nepal about 300 miles east of the capital Katmandu.

Sauerbrey visited some of the camps Friday and talked to a number of refugees -- some of whom have been living there for 17 years.

Relations between Nepal and Bhutan have been strained by the refugee issue. Several rounds of talks between top officials of the two nations have not yielded significant progress.

Sauerbrey is scheduled to fly to Bhutan today to discuss the refugee issues.

“The United States has consistently . . . pressed Bhutan to allow the repatriation of its own citizens, and we will continue to do so,” she said. “You have children that have been born and raised and never seen anything but the refugee camps. They deserve a better future.”