¡¡DAR ES SALAAM, Oct. 6 (Xinhuanet) -- Voluntary returns of Burundian refugees from Tanzania have slowed down in the past month due to increasing incredulity of Burundi's political stability.

    Seven trucks and one bus supplied by the United Nations and carrying 288 refugees from two camps bordering Burundi in the Ngara district left western Tanzania on Tuesday.

    The figure of refugee returnees has currently dropped to between 200 and 500 each time on Tuesdays and Thursdays, when repatriation exercise is carried out, whereas in July each repatriation day saw about 1,000 Burundian refugees heading home, local newspaper Daily News reported on Wednesday.

    The paper quoted Samuel Chakwera from the Ngara sub-office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees as saying the repatriation slows down due to several factors, including an increasing fear among refugees there might be conflict shortly before the country's elections scheduled at the end of this month.

    Most of the Burundians prefer to go back after the democratic polls and not before, the official said. Following the killing of 160 Congolese Tutsi refugees at the Gatumba camp in Burundi in August, Burundian refugees in Tanzania show much more worries about insecurity in some parts of their country.

    In western Tanzania, an estimated total of 300,000 Burundians reside in refugee camps after fleeing a civil war fueled by ethnicrivalry between its two major tribes since 1993. The war has already claimed more than 300,000 lives.

    The number of Burundian refugees returning home has increased since the latter half of 2003 when a rebel movement signed a power-sharing agreement with the transitional government.

    From January the Office of UN High Commissioner for Refugees has sent trucks and buses twice a week to ferry refugees home, helping them end a decade of exile.

    The number of voluntarily returning refugees peaked in July right before the power-sharing agreement was endorsed by 20 Burundian parties in early August. Enditem