IOM tries to end Ethiopians suffering caused by Saudi-led coalition in southern Yemen,Aden
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YemenExtra
Y.A
By Yousra Abdulmalik
The International Organization for Migration (IOM) declared ,Monday ,that it has evacuated 76 illegal Ethiopian immigrants from Yemen on Sunday.
“They were stranded in Aden, southern Yemen, and evacuated through the city’s port,” Sam Al-Malami, the media and communications officer at the IOM’s office in Yemen told Anadolu Agency.
“They will arrive at Djibouti, where they will be received by a team from the organization, before they are sent to their country,” he stated.
He explained that “these are the first batch of Ethiopian immigrants evacuated through the port of Aden, after being evacuated through the port of Hodeidah, west of Yemen.”These Ethiopians are illegal migrants who arrived in Yemen .
For decades, Yemen has received refugees who fled from the hardships of living in their countries and never the have been exposed to mistreatment like that revealed during the last few days in Aden. The abuse of refugees became very apparent during the two years of the Saudi Emirati controling of the country.
Human Rights Watch spoke in a report about executions, torture and rape of migrants and asylum seekers who were detained in Aden, and called for a clear investigation, pointing out that what is shown is not everything.
The UAE authorities in Aden, following the scandal, announced the removal of the official in charge of the detention center for migrants, but according to a report by Human Rights Watch, which included live testimony by African migrants detained, the UAE authorities in Aden took part in these shameful operations and were involved in torture and rape.
Former detainees said, “The guards beat them with iron bars and staves, kick and bunch them up, threatened them with killing and deportation, sexually assaulted them and shot them, leaving at least two killed. The male guards forced women to take off their headscarves and robes. They also confiscated the money, personal effects and documents given to them by the UN Refugee Agency. “, it added.
“The guards at the Migrant Detention Center in Aden attacked the men severely, raped women and boys, and deported hundreds of them across the sea in overcrowded boats,” said Bill Frelick, director of the Refugee Rights Program at Human Rights Watch. “The crisis in Yemen does not represent any justification for this cruelty and brutality, and the Yemeni government must end these practices and hold those responsible accountable. “
Human Rights Watch said it met with “eight migrants, seven of them were Oromo nationalists in Ethiopia, who had recently been detained at the center, as well as Yemeni government officials and members of immigrant communities.”
On March 18 ,2018, the Director of the Department of Refugee Affairs and Deportation in the city of Aden, Colonel Khalid al-Alwani ,said that he received a telephone call from Interior Minister, Ben Dagher Ahmed al-Misri, ordering him to release more than 800 African refugees from the deportation center in Brega.
Al-Alwani added that the refugees had been detained for years, including AIDS victims, some of belonge to al-Qaeda and Daesh and warned of dire consequences that could occur in the city if Al-Misri’s orders were carried out, blaming him for any future criminal events. Al-Alwani stated that the Minister of the Interior ordered the cessation of the provision of nutrition for refugees, yesterday, as a means to pressure the Department to release them.
In Iraq, the international organizations have documented thousands of cases and published horrific images of those stories inside and outside Abu Ghraib prison. Trump has recently appointed CIA official involved in torture and rape in Iraq. No American soldier has yet been charged for these crimes.The crimes that happened in Iraq and Yemen are similar.
Aden city, which was occupied by UK but now under the control of UAE, and the rest of the southern cities witnessed an insecurity situation that increased the assassinations of imams of mosques and security and military leaderships.
In March 2015, Saudi Arabia and a coalition of its regional allies — mainly the united Arab Emirates and Jordan — started a war against Yemen with the declared aim of crushing the Houthi Ansarullah movement, who had taken over from the staunch Riyadh ally and fugitive former president Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, while also seeking to secure the Saudi border with its southern neighbor. Three years and over 600,000 dead and injured Yemeni people later, the war has yielded little to that effect.