U.N. urges South Africa to let Zimbabweans stay

GENEVA (Reuters) - The U.N. refugee agency UNHCR, voicing deep concern about the xenophobic attacks on refugees and asylum seekers in South Africa, urged Pretoria to grant Zimbabweans the legal right to stay temporarily.

More than 17,000 people are estimated to have fled attacks in the past two weeks, including refugees and asylum seekers who went to South Africa seeking protection from persecution in their homelands, UNHCR spokeswoman Jennifer Pagonis said on Friday.

Mobs accuse African migrants of taking jobs and fuelling crime. The attacks spread from Johannesburg to Cape Town on Friday, where migrants' homes and shops were looted.

A very large percentage of those displaced by the xenophobic violence are Zimbabweans, Pagonis said, including people who had come to South Africa to seek asylum. "They urgently need both assistance and protection," she told a news briefing in Geneva.

Although most of the Zimbabwean migrants are in South Africa illegally, it is not feasible for them to return home to escape the violence.

"While thousands of Mozambicans are reportedly streaming home, many Zimbabweans cannot consider returning home due to the well-known situation in their country," she said, referring to post-election violence and other problems in Zimbabwe.

The UNHCR was "urging South Africa to exceptionally grant to Zimbabweans the possibility to regularise their stay in the country," an option foreseen under its national law, she said.

"Recent events in South Africa, as well as in their own country, are once again highlighting just how vulnerable this group is, making acting on UNHCR's appeal even more urgent today," Pagonis said.

UNHCR spokesman Andrej Mahecic clarified that this amounted to a request to allow the Zimbabweans to remain in South Africa temporarily.