Tunisia: Fishermen prevent anti-migrant ship from docking

BBC News
Tunisia fishermen prevent far-right ship from docking

Sunday, 6 August 2017

Tunisian fishermen have prevented a ship carrying European far-right activists from docking, dealing a blow to their mission to disrupt the flow of migrant boats from Africa to Europe.

The C-Star, chartered by French-based group Génération identitaire (GI), was unable to berth in Zarzis.

GI says non-governmental organisations active in the Mediterranean collude with people traffickers.
But the Zarzis fishermen said the anti-migrant activists were racists.

They vowed not to let the C-Star refuel if it landed and the vessel is now expected to try another Tunisian port on Monday.

"It is the least we can do given what is happening out in the Mediterranean," Chamseddine Bourassine, head of the local fishermen's organisation, told AFP news agency. "Muslims and Africans are dying."

A port official who asked to remain anonymous said: "Us let in racists here? Never."

Meanwhile humanitarian groups say any attempt to turn migrant boats back to Libya could be very dangerous and illegal under international law.

About 600,000 migrants have been rescued from traffickers' boats and taken to Italy since the beginning of 2014.

More than 10,000 people have died attempting to cross the Mediterranean over the same period.
Earlier this month rights group Amnesty International accused the EU of mostly leaving it up to sea rescue charities to save migrants.

At the same time, NGOs have come under criticism from the Italian authorities, who have threatened to stop vessels of other countries from bringing migrants to Italian ports.

Italy's parliament has approved a plan to send naval boats to Libya as part of its efforts to stop migrants crossing the Mediterranean, and is asking NGO rescue ships to abide by a code of conduct.
 


*Photos courtesy of AFP/Getty Images

Troops shoot dead another 5 Sudanese migrants, wound several others by border with Israel

Mada Masr

At least five Sudanese migrants shot dead by security forces near Israeli border

Monday, November 23, 2015

Egyptian border guards shot dead at least five Sudanese migrants and injured several others as they attempted to cross into Israel from North Sinai, according to a Ministry of Defense statement released on Monday.

Reports suggest that six people may have died, with up to 17 others injured. Five others were reportedly arrested after the incident.

Associated Press reported that six Sudanese migrants were killed while the wounded were later transferred to a hospital in Rafah. Agence France-Presse also reported six dead.

The Defense Ministry's statement reported that security forces “succeeded in foiling an attempt to infiltrate the international border in the north-east” of the country.

The shooting reportedly took place around dawn on Monday, although the exact location where it happened is as yet unknown.

The ministry’s statement claimed that Egyptian border guards fired “several” warning shots as smugglers prepared a group of Sudanese migrants to cross the border with Israel.

After the warning shots were fired, the statement continued, the smugglers responded with live fire.
A conscript was wounded during the shoot-out, according to the Defense Ministry statement.

The latest border deaths come just one week after another 15 Sudanese migrants were shot dead in North Sinai, with conflicting reports suggesting that they were either killed by border guards or in a cross-fire between security forces and Bedouin smugglers. The November 15 incident also happened as the migrants attempted to cross the border into Israel.

Egypt has in the past been fiercely criticized for a “shoot-to-stop” policy enforced along the border with Israel, which has cost the lives of dozens of refugees, asylum seekers and migrants hoping to find international protection or job opportunities in Israel.

According to a 2008 report by Human Rights Watch, Egyptian security forces shot at least 33 African migrants on the border between 2007 and 2008.

After 2009, North Sinai would later see hundreds of victims of trafficking, usually from Eritrea, kidnapped and then trafficked towards the border area in order to be tortured for vast amounts of ransom money.

It is thought this trafficking route was significantly hampered by the intensified security presence in North Sinai after 2013, and may have since moved west towards Libya, according to the US State Department’s 2015 report on global trafficking trends.

Although it appears refugees, asylum seekers and migrants from the Horn of Africa are still making the perilous journey towards Israel, the flow of Sudanese and other African migrants dropped significantly after 2011, when Israel fortified its border with Egypt using surveillance cameras, motion detectors and radar.

Egypt has meanwhile attracted criticism from Sudanese officials and newspapers, following growing reports of abuse and mistreatment by Sudanese nationals at the hands of Egyptian security forces.

Last week, the Sudanese Embassy in Cairo sent a letter to Egypt’s Foreign Affairs Ministry decrying security campaigns targeting Sudanese nationals in Egypt, who they say are increasingly subjected to searches and detention.

The embassy accused Egyptian security forces of mistreating its nationals, and noted that the ministry had not responded to an earlier letter on the matter sent at the beginning of the month.

Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesperson Ahmed Abu Zeid told a Sudanese newspaper on Monday that officials are looking into the embassy’s complaint, but he denied that Sudanese nationals in Egypt were being systematically targeted.

Sudan’s ruling National Congress Party has issued statements over the past couple days calling on Egyptian authorities to investigate the growing number of incidents and to immediately end such violations.



*Photo courtesy of the Associated Press

Sudan enraged as citizens arrested, tortured & killed in Egypt

Mada Masr
Sudan enraged by reports of Sudanese citizens arrested, tortured, killed in Egypt

November 18, 2015 

Sudan was outraged by the arrest, abuse and killing of Sudanese nationals in Egypt over the past few weeks, with a slew of social media campaigns, diplomatic statements and newspaper articles castigating the Egyptian authorities for what they say is a systematic campaign against them.

The Sudanese Embassy in Cairo sent a letter to Egypt’s Foreign Affairs Ministry on Friday decrying security campaigns targeting Sudanese nationals in Egypt, who they say are increasingly subjected to searches and detention. The embassy accused Egyptian security forces of mistreating its nationals, and noted that the ministry had not responded to an earlier letter on the matter sent at the beginning of the month.

Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesperson Ahmed Abu Zeid told a Sudanese newspaper on Monday that officials are looking into the embassy’s complaint, but he denied that Sudanese nationals in Egypt were being systematically targeted.

The Sudanese citizens who were arrested recently were suspected of illegally trading currency, Abu Zeid claimed, and were arrested alongside people of several other nationalities, including Egyptians.

Yehia Zakareya, a 50-year-old Sudanese man who was arrested after bringing his son to Egypt for surgery, gave an account of his arrest on Facebook that circulated widely online and enraged the Sudanese public.

Zakareya said he was arrested with another Sudanese man as they were leaving a currency exchange office in downtown Cairo’s Talaat Harb Square. He said they were taken to the Abdeen police station, where they were assaulted and tortured. Police also allegedly confiscated the US$500 Zakareya was carrying to pay for his son’s operation.

In pictures attached to his testimony, Zakareya appears to have bloodied eyes and bruises and burn marks on his arms and legs.

Zakareya said that he was then taken to the prosecutor, who ordered his release the next day and the return of his money. But instead, Zakareya was taken back to the police station pending national security checks.  He said for the next three days security forces continued to torture him, burning him with cigarettes and beating him with their boots.

He was eventually escorted to the airport, then flew back to Sudan after contacting family members to attend to his ill son in Cairo.

Social media campaigns were launched calling for Egyptians to be expelled from Sudan and a general boycott of Egyptian products. Social media users criticized the lack of a serious official response, and exhorted all Sudanese people to stand up for their dignity.

The Sudanese Al-Jareeda newspaper reported that the Sudanese parliament is waiting for Egyptian officials to comment on the arrest of hundreds of Sudanese nationals in the last few weeks, but all options are currently open in terms of the measures Sudanese authorities could take in response.

Ahmed Badawy, who works with the Egyptian Foundation for Refugee Rights, told Mada Masr that the surge in inspection campaigns targeting refugees and other foreigners started last month, ahead of the parliamentary elections.

The violations mostly target Sudanese people on tourist visas, rather than refugees registered with the United Nations, he said.

Mohamed Abdel Latif, a field researcher for the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, confirmed that the crackdown mainly targets unregistered visitors who do not have protection and support from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.

“Many of the arrests and the detentions of Sudanese people are associated with their attempt to cross the Mediterranean,” he said. Abdel Latif has documented several cases of migrants and refugees who were intercepted by police while attempting to leave the country, and were accused of belonging to smuggling networks.

In 2005, Egyptian security forces killed dozens of Sudanese refugees while violently dispersing a sit-in they were holding in Mostafa Mahmoud Square, where they had protested the government’s order to deport them back to Sudan.

Since then, a wave of Sudanese migrants and refugees have attempted to flee to Israel via Sinai.

Many people trying to cross the border have been shot or detained by Egyptian guards.

When Egyptian police forces shot 15 Sudanese people dead at the Egypt-Israel border earlier this week, outrage in Sudan mounted even further.

The number of Sudanese people attempting to cross the Sinai border has dropped recently, however, due to rising violence in the peninsula after the Armed Forces declared war against militant groups there.

Egyptian troops shoot dead 15 Sudanese migrants, wound 8 others on border with Israel

Mada Masr
15 Sudanese migrants killed by security forces on Egypt's border with Israel

Sunday, November 15, 2015
 

Egyptian border guards killed 15 Sudanese migrants at the Sinai border with Israel on Sunday as they were reportedly caught in the crossfire between security forces and Bedouin traffickers, according to the Associated Press. 

They were killed 17 kilometers South of Rafah City, where eight others were also shot in the chest and abdomen as they attempted to jump the border fence, AP reported, quoting unnamed security and hospital sources in the Sinai Peninsula.

Those injured are now being interrogated, after reportedly ignoring warning shots by security forces, AP added.

There has been little coverage of this fatal incident in Egyptian media or by government and security officials.

The privately owned Cairo News Portal issued a similar report, citing Agence France-Presse (AFP) and Israeli radio.

The incident is one of the bloodiest since December 2005, when Egyptian police forces killed 23 Sudanese nationals — including women, children, and the elderly — who had established a protest camp in the Mohandiseen district of Cairo. Consequently, many have sought asylum in Israel since 2006.

According to figures compiled by Human Rights Watch, Egyptian forces killed 10 people attempting to cross the border with Israel throughout 2007. In 2008, another 23 Sudanese and Sub-Saharan Africans were killed by Egyptian forces, and many others have experienced severe physical and psychological abuse from human traffickers.

Israel’s Interior Ministry claims there are over 45,000 African migrants in the country, most of whom are Sudanese and Eritrean refugees who have fled war and violence, although Israel classes them predominantly as economic migrants. Many have cited discrimination and threats of deportation by the Israeli state.

From 2011 to its completion in 2013, Israel fortified its border with Egypt by building a barrier equipped with cameras, motion detectors and radar to keep people from crossing.



*Photo courtesy of Shutterstock

Egypt/Sudan: End Torture of Refugees

HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH  
Egypt/Sudan: A Call to End Torture of Refugees

At UN, 24 Countries Seek Investigation

March 17, 2014

(Geneva) – Members of the UN Human Rights Council called on Egypt and Sudan on March 14, 2014, to investigate and prosecute traffickers for kidnapping, torturing, and killing refugees in the Sinai Peninsula. The 24 countries sponsoring the German-led statement also called on both countries to identify and prosecute any security officials who may have colluded with traffickers.

On February 11 Human Rights Watch released a report titled “‘I Just Wanted to Lie Down and Die:’ Trafficking and Torture of Eritreans in Sudan and Egypt,” which documents how, since 2010, Egyptian traffickers have tortured Eritreans for ransom in the Sinai Peninsula using rape, burning, and mutilation. It also documents torture by traffickers in eastern Sudan and 29 incidents in which victims said that Sudanese and Egyptian security officers facilitated trafficker abuses rather than arresting the traffickers and rescuing their victims.

“Four years on, there is almost complete impunity for traffickers in Sudan and Egypt who torture refugees and for any security officials working with them,” said Gerry Simpson, senior refugee researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Egypt and Sudan should respond to this call for action at the UN with concerted efforts to arrest the traffickers and show zero tolerance for colluding security officials.”

The statement at the human rights council and the report recognize that Sudan has taken some steps to investigate traffickers but say that these steps have not been sufficient. Although Egypt responded to the Human Rights Watch report by acknowledging the trafficker abuses for the first time, it has prosecuted only one trafficker in Cairo, and has neither investigated nor prosecuted traffickers in Sinai.

Human Rights Watch has received reports of trafficking from eastern Sudan to Sinai as recently as February.

The failure by both countries to adequately investigate and prosecute traffickers who severely abuse their victims and collusion by security officials breaches their obligations under the UN Convention against Torture, international human rights law, and, in Egypt’s case, national and international anti-trafficking laws, Human Rights Watch said.

The statement also calls on “countries involved” – a reference to Egypt – to stop detaining trafficking victims and to assist and protect them, including by allowing them to access the UN refugee agency in Egypt.

Human Rights Watch’s report documents that when traffickers freed Eritreans whose families have paid their ransom, Egyptian border police often intercepted the Eritreans. The police transferred the Eritreans’ cases to military prosecutors and then detained the Eritreans for months in inhuman and degrading conditions in Sinai police stations.

Egyptian prosecutors have charged the Eritreans with immigration offenses and denied them access to urgently needed medical care, as well as to the UN refugee agency. Those actions violate Egypt’s 2010 law on combatting human trafficking, which says trafficking victims should receive assistance, protection, and immunity from prosecution.

On March 13, 2014 the European Parliament also called on Egypt and Sudan to end the trafficker abuses and to investigate allegations of security force collusion with traffickers.

“Now that these appalling crimes are being addressed at the UN Human Rights Council, it is high time for Egypt and Sudan to publicly explain how they plan to address them,” Simpson said.

Egypt, Sudan: Human-trafficking of refugees must be stopped

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL

Egypt, Sudan: Kidnap and trafficking of refugees and asylum-seekers must be stopped

April 3, 2013

Egypt and Sudan must make urgent and concerted efforts to stop asylum-seekers and refugees being kidnapped from camps in Sudan, forcibly transported to Egypt, and being severely abused in the Sinai desert, Amnesty International said in a new briefing.

For over two years, refugees and asylum-seekers have been kidnapped from in and around the Shagarab refugee camps in eastern Sudan, near the Eritrean border. The vast majority of victims are Eritrean. They are then trafficked to Egypt’s Sinai desert, where they are held captive by Bedouin criminal gangs while ransom payments are demanded from their families.
 
Amnesty International has received repeated reports of brutal violence used against captives in Sinai, including rape and sexual abuse, beatings, burning and other violent and cruel treatment.
 
The captors reportedly telephone their victims’ relatives while inflicting violence in order to extort money, often demanding ransoms of up to USD 30-40,000.
 
Some refugees and asylum-seekers are murdered when their families are unable to pay the ransom, while others die from injuries or because of the extremely harsh conditions of captivity. One teenage boy held for eight months in Sinai witnessed seven deaths among the other captives during that time.
 
The organization is calling on the Egyptian security forces to investigate urgently reports that refugees and asylum-seekers are being held captive in compounds in northeast Sinai.
 
“The Egyptian authorities have a duty to protect any individual on their soil, and must urgently take steps to free all people held captive and subjected to appalling abuses in Sinai, and provide them with immediate medical attention and access to asylum procedures and support,” said Claire Beston, Amnesty International’s Eritrea researcher.
 
Amnesty International continues to receive fresh reports of kidnappings in and around the Shagarab camps, and is alarmed at the apparently inadequate safety and security provision there. Security measures in the camps must be urgently improved.  
 
“It is particularly worrying that numerous victims have alleged that the members of the Sudanese National Security Service are involved in the kidnappings near the borders with Eritrea and Ethiopia. 

The Sudanese government must investigate all allegations of the involvement or complicity of Sudanese officers and where sufficient evidence is found, individuals must be arrested and prosecuted,” said Claire Beston.
 
According to testimonies gathered by Amnesty International, captives in Sinai suffer extreme violence and cruelty, including repeated rape and other forms of sexual violence, beatings with chains, burning with heated plastic and metal, electric shocks, suspension from the ceiling, and being doused with gasoline and set on fire.
 
An Eritrean survivor describes what happened to one of the other captives who was ‘made an example of’ because he said his family could not pay: 
 
“He was bleeding all over. After more beatings, they poured petrol on him and set him on fire. After he died, they left his body in the room with us until it became rotten and worms started crawling. They forced all of us in turns to hold him.”
 
Amnesty International urges the governments of Egypt and Sudan to make significant efforts to bring anyone involved in the crimes of kidnapping and human trafficking to justice.
 
Amnesty International also calls on the countries along the trafficking route – running from Eritrea through Ethiopia and Sudan into Egypt, to work together to bring an end to the kidnapping, trafficking and horrific abuses, and to increase engagement with international agencies’ initiatives to tackle these crimes.
 
However, it must be ensured that regional cooperation does not infringe in any way on the rights and safety of refugees and asylum seekers. 
 
The majority of victims of abuses in Sinai who have been freed are now in Israel, while some are in Egypt and Ethiopia. Destination countries, including Israel, must put in place transparent systems to identify victims of trafficking and other abuses, and provide victims with access to medical, psycho-social and rehabilitation services and to fair asylum procedures.

Israel completes bulk of Egyptian border fence

REUTERS

Israel completes bulk of Egypt border fence

January 2, 2013

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel completed the main segment of a razor-wire fence along its border with Egypt on Wednesday, a barrier against illegal migrants and Islamist militants hiding out in the lawless Sinai region.

The five-meter high fence, bolstered by military surveillance equipment, is touted by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as proof of his commitment to the Jewish state's security as he campaigns for a national election on January 22.

Once the final 14 kilometer (8.5 mile) section is completed within three months, the fence will stretch from Israel's Red Sea port of Eilat to the Gaza Strip on the Mediterranean.

In the desert beyond, hardline Islamist groups have expanded in a security vacuum caused by the overthrow of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in 2011 and efforts to re-impose central authority have been slow.

Islamist gunmen killed at least 16 Egyptian border guards in Sinai last August and hijacked an armored vehicle which they smashed across the frontier before they were killed by Israeli forces.

With security and illegal immigration a target of his campaign, Netanyahu travelled by military helicopter to the southern frontier for a ceremony marking the completion of the 230 km (143 miles) section of fence.

His government has accelerated its construction, deported some migrants and imposed legal penalties on Israelis who hire them without work permits.

Thirty-six migrants crossed illegally into Israel last month and were arrested, compared with 2,153 who entered a year ago, Netanyahu's office said in a statement.

"Just as we stopped completely the infiltration into Israeli cities, we will succeed in the next mission - the repatriation of tens of thousands of infiltrators already in Israel to their home countries," it cited Netanyahu as saying at the ceremony.

More than 60,000 Africans have entered Israel on foot in recent years seeking work or refuge. They have stirred fears for public order and some have come under racially-motivated attack.
The bulk are from Sudan or Eritrea and Israel's ability to repatriate them is limited. Sudan's government is hostile to Israel and Somalia is deemed a ravaged danger zone by refugee advocates.

Israel portrays the vast majority of the migrants as illegal job-seekers. Humanitarian agencies say they should be considered for asylum.

*Reporting by Jeffrey Heller & Dan Williams; Editing: Tom Pfeiffer

 **Photo courtesy of REUTERS/Baz Ratner

 

Egyptian border guards kill African migrant

Associated Press
Egyptian border guards kill African migrant

Dec. 05, 2011

Ashraf Sweilam

EL-ARISH, Egypt — A security official says Egyptian police have shot dead an African migrant and wounded three others near the border with Israel.

The security official says the four men, all in their 20s, were trying to illegally enter Israel from Egypt's Taba border region in the Sinai Peninsula on Monday.

He says three wounded men are Eritreans. The fourth, who was shot dead, did not have identification on him.

The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief the media.

Thousands of Africans try to reach Israel from Egypt every year, risking a dangerous desert crossing in hopes of getting work or asylum.

Egyptian border guards trying to stem the flow of illegal migration into Israel have killed dozens of migrants in recent years.

Egypt: Police Violence Highlights Need to Reform CSF

Human Rights Watch
Egypt: Cairo Violence Highlights Need to Reform Riot Police

Investigate Violent Response by Central Security Forces; Create Code of Conduct

July 8, 2011

(Cairo) - The clashes in Cairo on June 28 and 29, 2011, between police and protesters in which more than 1,000 people were injured highlight the urgent need to reform security forces, Human Rights Watch said today. The government should promptly formulate an interim code of conduct for policing demonstrations and order a thorough investigation into any improper use of firearms and riot control weapons by the riot police during the protests.

"The video footage of Central Security officers throwing stones back at protesters and firing teargas recklessly is ample evidence of the need for police to follow basic international standards," said Joe Stork, deputy Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch. "With more demonstrations expected on July 8, the government needs to act quickly to prevent more mayhem and injury."

The Central Security Forces (CSF), Egypt's riot police, has a well-documented history of using excessive force against peaceful demonstrators as well as of shooting unarmed migrants on the Sinai border. The most recent incident was on June 25. A security official who did not give his name told Agence France-Presse that border police had shot dead four African migrants attempting to cross the border, bringing the total shot dead in 2011 to eight.

POLICE VIOLENCE, CROWD CONTROL FAILURE ON JUNE 28 AND 29

The government said on June 29 that it had ordered an investigation into the 16-hour standoff between the CSF riot police and protesters objecting to the government's failure to prosecute former officials. According to the Ministry of Health, the clashes had injured 1,114 people by the afternoon of June 29. Interior Minister Mansour al-Eissawi denied that police had used excessive force against demonstrators, saying that they had used only teargas, but the quasi-official National Council for Human Rights, as well as independent Egyptian human rights organizations, documented the use of rubber bullets and pellet guns.

Police arrested at least 44 people at the scene and brought them all before military prosecutors, who ordered them detained for 15 days pending investigations on charges of assaulting public officials, destruction of public property, and possession of illegal weapons. The ongoing use of military courts to try civilians reflects a disturbing disregard for international standards and due process rights, Human Rights Watch said.

The violence started at the Balloon Theater in Cairo's Agouza neighborhood on June 28, though there are conflicting accounts about what set it off. Activists said that police had attacked the families of protesters killed during the January uprising, but officials later said there was a premeditated attack on the police by armed thugs.

At about 10 p.m. activists started sending out calls online for people to gather at the Interior Ministry on Sheikh Rihan Street in downtown Cairo in solidarity with the families of the victims. The demonstration there spread to surrounding streets over the next 14 hours.

Footage from the Balloon Theater incident posted on YouTube by activists appears to show four police officers, three in riot police uniform and one in regular police uniform, surround and beat a civilian man who had one arm in a sling and was holding up a poster of a victim of police violence during the January uprising. The footage shows the officers dragging the man across the street, beating him until he falls to the ground, and giving him what appear from the image and buzzing sound to be electroshocks with a short black device.

One protester told Human Rights Watch that by the time he arrived at the Interior Ministry at around 11 p.m., hundreds of angry protesters had gathered on the street outside, facing rows of riot police guarding the ministry and that the protesters and police were throwing stones at each other.

Human Rights Watch spoke with 10 witnesses, some of them protesters, who gave consistent accounts of seeing men in civilian clothing armed with sticks, and sometimes with metal rods and stones, standing with the riot police officers and apparently operating under their command.

Video footage taken by Mostafa Bahgat, a video-journalist for the news site Masry al-Youm, shows Central Security officers throwing rocks at protesters for several minutes at a time from the evening of June 28 through the next morning. It also shows the police firing teargas into the crowd at eye-level rather than into the air, at times kneeling on the ground as they fired directly at protesters, or shooting out of their vans.

One witness told Human Rights Watch that he saw a young man hit in the face with a teargas canister at around 4 a.m. on June 29. Another witness told Human Rights Watch that at around 1 a.m., on Mohamed Mahmud Street, he saw a young man with a bleeding wound in his stomach that may have come from a rubber bullet. Police also used pellet guns to disperse the demonstrators, witnesses said.

On June 30, Interior Minister Mansour al-Eissawi told the Egyptian private TV station Tahrir TV, "The Interior Ministry used nothing but teargas, there were no bullets, not even rubber ones."

But a doctor at a makeshift clinic just off Tahrir Square told Human Rights Watch on the morning of June 29 that the injuries he had seen throughout the night included severe breathing difficulties, some knife wounds, and a few cases of wounds caused by rubber bullets as well as second-degree burns caused by teargas canisters fired at close range.

"The interior minister's denial of wrongful police behavior before any official investigation took place is premature and not a good sign of his commitment to change the way security forces operate," Stork said. "The first step should be to ensure a full and impartial investigation of the violence captured on video and to hold all transgressors accountable - police as well as protesters."

CENTRAL SECURITY FORCE VIOLENCE AT THE BORDER

Since mid-2007 Egypt's border guards, who are part of the CSF, have shot dead at least 93 unarmed migrants as they tried to cross the border into Israel. Human Rights Watch, the United Nations high commissioner for human rights, and other organizations have repeatedly criticized this lethal and unjustified use of force. Egyptian officials have said that the border police follow a common warning procedure before directly targeting people who are trying to cross.

However, international standards on the intentional use of lethal force by law enforcement agents say that such force should only be used when strictly necessary to protect life, whether or not there are warning shots. The Egyptian authorities have never explained why lethal force is justified when used against migrants fleeing from the police.

"The policy of shooting unarmed migrants along the Sinai border is one of the most abhorrent practices of the Mubarak regime and should not be occurring in post-Tahrir Egypt," Stork said. "The apparent resumption of this practice shows a blatant disregard for the right to life and is one that the minister can halt immediately with one order."

EGYPT'S POLICE LAW AND IMPUNITY FOR VIOLENCE AT DEMONSTRATIONS

The CSF riot police are responsible for policing demonstrations and public gatherings and have frequently used excessive force against unarmed civilians, Human Rights Watch research has shown. Under former President Hosni Mubarak, the authorities did not investigate the use of excessive force against demonstrators or punish those responsible.

Egypt's Police Law provides overly broad powers to police dispersing demonstrations that are not consistent with international standards, Human Rights Watch said. Article 102 of Egypt's 1971Police Law No. 109 provides that:

[P]olice officers may use necessary force to perform their duties if this is the only means available. The use of firearms is restricted ... to disperse crowds or demonstrations of at least five people if this threatens public security after issuing a warning to demonstrators to disperse. The order to use firearms shall be issued by a commander, who must be obeyed.

Beyond this provision, Egypt has no code of conduct regulating the use of force and firearms by CSF.

The UN Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms stipulate that law enforcement officials "shall, as far as possible, apply nonviolent means before resorting to the use of force" and may use force "only if other means remain ineffective." When the use of force is unavoidable, law enforcement officials must "exercise restraint in such use and act in proportion to the seriousness of the offence."

"Peaceful demonstrators who plan to gather in Tahrir Square to call for justice for the victims of the uprising and a full transition to democracy need to feel confident that the police will protect them and that any resort to use of force will be responsible and proportionate," Stork said. "The minister of interior needs to announce a strategy on how he plans to reform the riot police."


*In Arabic:

مصر: أعمال عنف القاهرة تلقي الضوء على الحاجة لإصلاح الأمن المركزي

***

South Sudan's independence referendum

REUTERS
FACTBOX-South Sudan's independence referendum
January 9, 2011

Jan 9 (Reuters) - Millions of southern Sudanese begin voting on Sunday in a referendum on whether Africa's largest country will split in two. Here are some facts about the vote.

WHY A REFERENDUM?

Sudan's north-south civil war was Africa's longest-running civil conflict, flaring in 1955. A 2005 peace deal ended the latest phase and promised southerners self-determination through a referendum on independence from the north.

Since then, the northern ruling National Congress Party and the former southern rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) have bickered over implementing almost every detail of the 2005 accord and mutual distrust has deepened. Few believe a majority of southerners will vote for unity.

Many southerners believe they are ethnically or religiously distinct from the mostly Arab and Muslim north, and a history of war and slave trading has haunted north-south relations since before independence. Southerners say an economic boom and development has been concentrated in the hands of the northern tribes surrounding Khartoum, while they have been neglected.

WHO CAN VOTE?

According to the referendum commission, anyone who has a parent or ancestor from a southern tribe indigenous to the south can vote. Also anyone who has been permanently resident, or whose parents or grandparents have been in the south since independence on Jan. 1, 1956, can vote.

Southerners whose families left before independence must return south to register and vote. Southerners in the north of Sudan and in Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Australia, Britain, the United States, Canada and Egypt can also vote. However, the vague guidelines and decades of inter-marriage and movement of tribes means it may be difficult to verify who is a southerner.

Almost 4 million southerners have registered to vote inside and outside Sudan, organisers said, about 75 percent of those eligible.

HOW WILL IT WORK?

The referendum law states that of those registered, 60 percent need to turn out for the vote to be valid. About 10,800 staff will work in almost 3,000 referendum centres and more than 14,000 police will secure the process in the south. The north has deployed 17,500 police. Voting is due to begin on Jan. 9 and last one week. The 10,000-strong United Nations peacekeeping force in Sudan, separate from a much bigger U.N.-African Union force in the Darfur region, will also help to maintain security. Some 3,000 observers have been accredited to monitor the process in the north and south.

TIMING

The referendum law should have been passed three years ago and the commission formed immediately after, but commission members took their oath in July 2010, giving them just six months to arrange the vote.

The commission, helped by the international community, has managed to arrange the vote on time in the face of mounting logistical obstacles. However, the schedule laid out by the Referendum Law has been forsaken, leaving the vote vulnerable to legal challenges. Parliament has yet to amend the law. The result should be announced by Feb. 15, 2011, although preliminary results for the south -- the majority of voters -- will be announced on Jan. 31.

VIOLENCE

The disputed oil-producing Abyei region is supposed to hold a simultaneous plebiscite on whether to join the south or the north. But deep north-south divisions over who will vote and who will plan it mean this referendum may not happen at all.

Most analysts believe Abyei, the site of north-south clashes since 2005, could provoke a more general war if left to fester.

Other areas could include oil fields close to the still disputed border such as Heglig and Unity. Border states Southern Kordofan and Blue Nile could also be flashpoints of violence and both north and south armies have traded accusations of troop build ups along the unmarked border.

WHY IS IT IMPORTANT?

Many African nations favour Sudan's unity because they fear the split could fuel secessionist tensions in their own countries. Sudan also marks the continent's Arab north-African and black sub-Saharan divide. Many will see a split as a wider failure to overcome those differences.

Some worry secession could lead to demands for autonomy in Sudan's other regions, including Darfur or the east which have also rebelled against Khartoum, and the country could disintegrate. Others fear if southerners are not given the chance to vote on whether to rule themselves, the north-south civil war, which destabilised much of east Africa, could reignite.

(Reporting by Opheera McDoom; Editing by Janet Lawrence)

Israel starts building barrier on Egyptian border

BBC News
Israel starts building barrier on Egypt border

22 November 2010

Work is beginning in Israel on a barrier along the border with Egypt, aimed at stemming the flow of illegal immigrants into the country.

The barrier, including an electric fence and surveillance technology, will run for 250km (155 miles).

Work on the $372m (£232m) project is expected to take up to a year.

Hundreds of migrants - including many asylum seekers - enter Israel from Egypt every week, Israeli government figures suggest.

Egyptian border guards have shot dead dozens of migrants - mostly from Africa - in recent years.

Egyptian officials insist they only shoot at the border after those crossing ignore repeated orders to stop, and point out that human-trafficking gangs carry guns.

However, the United Nations and human rights groups have asked Egypt to stop excessive force being used.

The Israeli government says the barrier will also control the threat of Islamic militants, who cross into Egypt from the Gaza Strip and then try to infiltrate Israeli territory.

"MAJOR THREAT"

The Israeli defence ministry said on Sunday that "dozens of heavy engineering vehicles will be deployed at points along the Israeli-Egypt border" on Monday.

The Israeli government approved the construction of the barrier in March, after months of planning and preparatory work.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has described the influx of illegal migrants across the border as a major threat to "the Jewish and democratic character of the state of Israel".

The Israeli immigration authority said in a report earlier this month that some 700 illegal migrants - a record number - infiltrated through the Egypt-Israel border on a weekly basis, Israel's Haaretz newspaper says.

This marked an increase of about 300% since the start of 2010, according to the report, which put the number of migrants at 10,858 over the January-November period.

In 2009, 4,341 migrants were recorded.

A deal struck between Libya and Italy in 2009 has cut off a popular sea route to Europe for illegal African migrants and helped direct the flow towards Israel, the BBC's Yolande Knell in Cairo says.

Our correspondent adds that many African migrants believe that Israel is currently offering better work opportunities and more Western standards.

Some migrants claim political asylum but that is only granted by Israel in very rare cases.

Egypt: Police kill Sudanese migrant at Israel border

Agence France-Presse
Egypt police shoot dead Sudanese migrant at Israel border

October 30, 2010

EL-ARISH, Egypt — Egyptian border guards shot dead a Sudanese migrant who was trying to slip across the frontier into Israel on Saturday, a security official said.

The official said the 28-year-old was shot in the head after the guards traded fire with smugglers who accompanied several migrants early in the morning.

Two Sudanese migrants in the group were arrested and the others fled with the smugglers.

The New York-based group Human Rights Watch this month urged Egypt to stop shooting migrants, saying its security forces have killed at least 85 migrants trying to cross into Israel since 2007.

Egypt, which holds the rotating chair of the United Nations refugee agency's governing body, says its police fire warning shots in the air.

Egyptian soldiers shoot migrant near Israel border

Deutsche Presse-Agentur
Egyptian soldiers injure migrant near Israel border

October 9,2010

El-Arish, Egypt - A migrant was shot and injured by Egyptian security forces Saturday during a failed attempt to smuggle himself into neighbouring Israel.

Security forces said the Eritrean national was caught near the Sinai peninsula's border with Israel along with two other compatriots and five Sudanese, bringing the total number of migrants arrested there this week to 22.

The officials said the injured man did not respond to warnings to stop. He was taken to hospital for treatment.

HRW tells Egypt to stop shooting migrants

Agence France-Presse
HRW tells Egypt to stop shooting migrants

October 8, 2010

CAIRO — Human Rights Watch urged Egypt on Friday to stop shooting foreign migrants who try to cross into Israel, as the African country began chairing the United Nations' refugee agency.

The New York-based rights group said Egyptian border police have killed at least 85 unarmed migrants trying to cross into Israel since July 2007.

"Egypt today becomes chair of the UNHCR's governing body, while back home it shoots unarmed migrants and blocks UNHCR's access to detainees seeking the agency's protection," it quoted deputy Middle East director Joe Stork as saying.

"To be consistent with its position as the executive committee's new chair, Egypt needs to put its own house in order."

The group said most of the migrants killed were Sudanese or Eritrean.

"It is likely that at least some had a reasonable case for asylum," it said.

Egypt has defended its policy and says border guards first fire warning shots in the air.

The border between Israel and Egypt, which runs along the desert of the Sinai peninsula, is also used by drug traffickers.

A Cairo-based representative of HRW told AFP more migrants were killed trying to leave Egypt than any other country.

"This is the worst border in the world now in terms of the number of lethal shootings of unarmed migrants," said Heba Morayef. "It is the only border where this many migrants are shot on the way out."

Israel, which is constructing a fence along the border to stop the migrants, has asked Egypt to do more to stem the influx. The migrants complain of discrimination and poverty in Egypt.

The group accused Egypt of impeding the UNHCR's access to imprisoned asylum seekers and "unlawfully" deporting recognised refugees.

"Egypt should also stop impeding the refugee agency's access to foreign nationals detained in Egypt who want to claim asylum," it said.

"If Egypt as the chair of UNHCR's executive committee continues to shoot at foreign nationals trying to leave and prevents the refugee agency from fulfilling its protection mandate, it will discredit not only itself but also UNHCR," Stork said.

Egyptian Police Kill Sudanese Migrant at Israeli Border

Agence France Presse
Egypt police kill migrant on Israel border

September 18, 2010

CAIRO — Egyptian police killed a Sudanese man and wounded three others on Saturday when they opened fire on would-be migrants trying to enter Israel, the official MENA news agency reported.

Mohammed Adam Sharafeddin, 38, died of the gunshot wounds while his three compatriots were taken to hospital and the rest of the group who were trying to cross the border were arrested, MENA said.

The death raises to 31 the number of migrants killed on Egypt's border with Israel since the beginning of the year -- most of them by Egyptian police.

Cairo has come under fire from human rights groups condemning its policy of using lethal force against migrants.

The 250-kilometre (150-mile) border has become a major trafficking route for African migrants seeking jobs in Israel.

Egypt: Police Kill Sudanese Attempting To Enter Israel

The Canadian Press
Egyptian police kill Sudanese trying to enter Israel

Ashraf Sweilam

(CP) – Sep 10, 2010

EL-ARISH, Egypt — An Egyptian security official says police have killed a Sudanese migrant trying to cross into Israel.

The official says the police fired warning shots but the migrant refused to surrender on Friday about 100 miles (160 kilometres) south of the Rafah border crossing with Israel.

The official said police also arrested two Eritrean migrants south of Rafah in a separate incident.

They Eritreans said they had paid $1,000 each to Bedouin traffickers to help them cross into Israel.

The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak to the media.

Many migrants seeking political asylum and jobs try to cross into Israel with the help of Bedouin traffickers. Egypt has killed dozens of migrants in the past two years, drawing criticism from rights groups.

Egypt: Police Kill African Migrant at Israeli Border

Agence France Presse
Egypt police kill migrant trying to cross into Israel

(AFP) - Sep 3, 2010

EL-ARISH, Egypt — Egyptian police shot dead a man from sub-Saharan Africa on Friday as he tried to cross the border illegally into Israel, a security official said.

"An Egyptian patrol spotted a group of migrants as they were trying to infiltrate Israel south of the Rafah terminal," he said. "When the police asked them to stop, they refused and tried to flee into Israel.

"Police had to fire on the African migrants, which led to the death of one of them," he said, without identifying the victim.

He said two Sudanese were arrested and that the rest of the group was able to get away.

Friday's death takes to 30 the number of migrants killed on the Egypt-Israel border since the beginning of the year -- 25 of them by Egyptian police.

Cairo has rejected strong criticism from human rights groups of its policy of using potentially lethal force against migrants along its 250-kilometre (150-mile) border with Israel.

The Sinai desert border has become a major trafficking route for African migrants seeking jobs and for eastern European women headed for the sex trade.

Egypt: A Prison for African Migrants?

Ethiopian Journal News
The Egyptian territory has become a human prison for African migrants

Tuesday, 24 August 2010

They are hung from trees by metal chains attached to their arms and provided with plastic bags to collect their urine to drink when they are thirsty. They are gang raped, tortured with electricity and held prisoner in desert camps. When they escape they are shot, either by their Beduin captors or by Egyptian police. These savage and disturbing details, published piecemeal over the years, are just a part of the picture of what is being done in Egypt’s Sinai desert to African migrants.

The story probably begins with the end of the Ethiopia-Eritrea War in 2000, the beginning of the Darfur genocide in 2003 and the end of the war in South Sudan in 2005, each of which in its own way created numerous refugees. In December 2005, Egypt began cracking down on African migrants, in one infamous incident many (between 10 and 60) were massacred by police attempting to clear a park of their encampments.

This helped provide incentive to travel further afield, with Europe a tough destination, they trickled into Sinai and thence to Israel. Eritreans, who now make up the majority of refugees (10,000+), have been arriving in Israel since 2007. In that year it was reported that 48 African refugees deported to Egypt by Israel had been abused and then disappeared. One migrant claimed Egyptians imprisoned him and “poured boiling water on his body.”

At the time Egypt was busy trying to get rid of the refugees, sending them back to Sudan if possible. Criticism about the “disappearances” was raised by activists in 2007 mostly to complain that Israel should stop its “hot return” policy of immediately returning refugees to Egypt. One report alleged that 139 refugees had disappeared.

What the disappearances highlight is the increasing brutalization meted out to Africans in Sinai beginning in 2007.

Between July 2007 and October 2008, the media reported that 33 Africans were shot in Sinai while trying to cross the border into Israel. By March of 2010 more than sixty had been killed. The man charged with implementing the policy is General Muhammad Shousha, governor of north Sinai. For him it is quite clear; “of course it’s not a mistake that we shoot them, it’s necessary to shoot them. To deal with an infiltrator, he has to be fired at.” The migrants reported that the Egyptian border guards shot at women and children and that if they were captured alive they were then subjected to beatings and insults; “you are a Jew” and “you are the enemy of the Arabs and of Islam.”

They also claimed that the Egyptians wanted to know who trafficked them.

Suspicion of the Africans is part of a larger story. Some Egyptians argue that the smuggling is bad because it strengthens Israel; one Sinai resident claims “we are helping Israel. These migrants will go, take away Arabs’ jobs, work in agriculture and construction and it will all contribute to Israel’s plans.”

The privately owned, independent Egyptian newspaper Al Masry Al Youm has done some intrepid reporting on other horrors experienced by the migrants while in Sinai. An Ethiopian named Youssef related that he had gone to Khartoum in Sudan to work in a hotel and was approached by a Sudanese man who promised him a job in Egypt. He boarded a truck with others from Sudan and Eritrea and was transported in five days to Sinai. There he discovered the lure of a job was a scam and instead he was imprisoned by his Beduin smugglers. They demanded $3,000 and told him they would then take him to the Israeli border. Another man named Ali, also from Ethiopia, experienced a similar bait-and-switch.

He was beaten daily and told to phone family and raise money for his release.

IN JANUARY the Israeli police arrested an Ethiopian and two Eritrean migrants for involvement in extortion and human smuggling. The three men had been hired by Beduin in Sinai to contact families of imprisoned Africans in Israel and extort money for the release of their family members being held in Sinai.

When arrested the men had $100,000, evidently collected to be sent on to Sinai for the release of African refugees. The stories coming out of Sinai are horrifying.

Migrants speak of desert camps run by the Rashida Beduin tribe. They are watched over by armed guards and tortured by being scalded with heated metal bars.

Modern day slavery exists. One woman, Wizar Tasapai from Eritrea, was tied up and kept in a fuel tank and told her kidneys would be sold if her family in Israel didn’t pay $2,800. The Beduin told her cousin “the girl is in a bad condition.

She is beaten and raped.” Her family paid the ransom to an Eritrean at the Central Bus Station in Tel Aviv and he transferred it to Beduin. The woman eventually made it to Israel. Rape seems to be a typical brutality carried out by the Beduin smugglers against African women. An Eritrean woman reported to the Israeli authorities in February 2010 that she had been raped by eight Beduin men in Sinai.

A July 2010 report noted that women were often separated from the men and that they were all held in prisons underground.

In the same month the bodies of 10 African migrants were found mutilated in Sinai.

According to the Beduin of northern Sinai, the Egyptian security forces arrest them on smuggling charges.

But a recent incident seems to contradict those claims. On August 14th it was reported that 300 Africans were being held prisoner at a Beduin camp. One of them managed to steal a weapon and free several others. In an ensuing gun battle six Eritreans were killed. Egyptian police fanned out from al-Mahdeyya village, south of Rafah and shot two fleeing Eritreans and arrested 17 others.

There was no report that the Egyptians tried in any way to free those migrants being held captive. The Egyptian police seem primarily interested in killing or expelling the migrants.

Today Sinai has become a human prison, a place of death, gang rape and murder. While initially many of the Africans were refugees it seems now that, as with the sex slave trade in Eastern European women that was a staple of the 1990s in Sinai, the slave trade in Africans in Sinai has become a business – one where victims are recruited and then transported to Israel only as a way to get rid of the human cargo.

Israel has decent relations with Egypt’s security forces in Sinai. It is time to send the message that only a massive and coordinated crackdown on the Beduin smugglers will stop the flow of illegal immigrants, help Egypt’s image and end the hell that Sinai has become.

Eritrean migrant dies after Israel border shooting

REUTERS
Eritrean migrant dies after Israel border shooting

23 Aug 2010

ISMAILIA, Egypt, Aug 23 (Reuters) - An Eritrean migrant who was shot by Egyptian police ten days ago while trying to slip into Israel died late on Sunday, medical sources said, raising the migrant death toll along the Egypt-Israel border.

The death of the 25-year-old man brings the number of migrants killed by smugglers and police in the incident to eight.

At least 30 migrants have died along the sensitive border so far this year, with at least 25 killed by Egyptian police and the rest by smugglers. Border forces killed a total of 19 migrants in 2009.

Egyptian police also detained 19 African migrants who attempted to cross the border in a separate incident on Sunday, security sources said.

The Sinai penninsula is a major transit route for African migrants and refugees seeking work or asylum in Israel. It is also used by smugglers to ferry narcotics and weapons into Israel along with a range of goods into the blockaded Gaza Strip.

Egypt has come under pressure from Israel to stop the flow of migrants through their joint border, as well as from international rights groups who want it to investigate the suspected use of excessive force against unarmed migrants.

Security forces say they fire at migrants only after repeated orders to stop are ignored, and that in some cases smugglers have opened fire on border police.

(Reporting by Yusri Mohamed; Writing by Yasmine Saleh)

(Editing by Nina Chestney and Noah Barkin)

Seven Eritreans Shot Dead at Egypt-Israel Border

Agence France Presse
Eritrean death toll on Israel-Egypt border rises
August 15, 2010

EL-ARISH, Egypt — An Eritrean woman shot in clashes with smugglers and police on Egypt's border with Israel earlier in the week died of her injuries on Sunday, raising the death toll to seven, a security official said.

The woman was among a group of African migrants who were trying to sneak into Israel from Egypt on Friday when the deadly clashes broke out.

Four Eritreans were killed on the spot by smugglers when migrants seized their weapons in a bid to escape, while two others were shot dead by Egyptian police barring them from illegally crossing the border.

The police detained 22 migrants on Friday and launched a manhunt for other members of the group estimated to number 60 -- some of whom were said to be armed -- and for the smugglers.

On Saturday, four of the migrants managed to cross into Israel, five others were arrested and two -- an Eritrean and a Sudanese -- were wounded as border guards opened fire, the official said.

Friday's smuggling operation turned deadly when the traffickers demanded more money to release the migrants after a failed bid to smuggle them across the border, migrants told police.

Twenty-nine African migrants have now been killed this year trying to cross to Israel in search of a better life and job prospects, 24 of them by Egypt's police, according to the security services, compared to 19 last year.

Agence France Presse
Six Eritreans 'shot dead on Egypt-Israel border'
August 14, 2010

EL-ARISH, Egypt — Smugglers and police have shot dead six Eritreans near the Israeli border, in the latest case of illegal crossings that have become perilous, an Egyptian security official said on Saturday.

The deadly clashes took place late on Friday after the African migrants seized the weapons of the people traffickers in a bid to escape, the official told AFP on condition of anonymity.

He said four Eritreans -- three men and a woman -- were killed in an exchange of fire between the migrants and smugglers, and police shot dead two Eritreans from the same group as they tried to cross illegally into Israel.

The police detained 22 migrants, five of whom were wounded in the violence, and were still searching for the smugglers as well as for other members of the group estimated to number 60, the security official said.

After a failed attempt to smuggle the migrants into Israel, the traffickers had demanded money for their release, migrants told the police.

The deaths bring to 28 the number of African migrants killed so far this year in attempts to cross to Israel in search of a better life and job prospects, 24 of them by Egypt's police, according to the security services.

The figure compares with 19 migrants killed last year in Egypt, a country with a 1979 peace treaty with Israel which has called for stricter border controls. Most of the migrants hail from Eritrea, Sudan and Ethiopia.

Cairo has rejected harsh criticism from human rights groups of its policy of using potentially lethal force against migrants along its 250-kilometre (150-mile) border with Israel.

The Sinai desert border has become a major trafficking route for African migrants seeking jobs and for east European women headed for the sex trade.