Egypt's secret scheme to detain and deport thousands of Sudanese refugees
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John Ashworth
Apr 26, 2024, 2:22:44 AMApr 26
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Inside Egypt's secret scheme to detain and deport thousands of Sudanese refugees
‘I pleaded with the soldiers, but they refused to help us.’
About this investigation: Last summer, the Refugees Platform in Egypt,
a civil society organisation that defends human rights, contacted The
New Humanitarian to share evidence that the Egyptian military was
carrying out large-scale deportations of Sudanese refugees. Reporters
substantiated the allegations by interviewing dozens of refugees,
lawyers, and right groups, obtaining documents from inside secretive
government agencies, and through open source investigative techniques.
Sara Creta and Nour Khalil
The New Humanitarian
25 April 2024
ASWAN, Egypt
Thousands of Sudanese refugees who escaped to neighbouring Egypt have
been detained by Egyptian authorities in a network of secret military
bases, and then deported back to their war-torn country often without
the chance to claim asylum, an investigation by The New Humanitarian
and the Refugees Platform in Egypt has found.
The pushbacks uncovered by reporters contravene refugee conventions
that Egypt has ratified, and are being carried out as the EU has
pledged billions of dollars to Cairo in exchange for the government
curtailing migration to Europe, a deal that critics say could make
European countries complicit in the abuses taking place.
The pushbacks are also being enforced amid a worsening of the
year-long war between the Sudanese army and its former ally, the
powerful paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF). The fighting is
expanding into new parts of the country, leaving tens of thousands of
people dead, and triggering warnings of a looming famine.
“I pleaded with the soldiers, explaining that my mother was gravely
ill and urgently needed medical attention, but they refused to help
us,” said 25-year-old Hassan, who was deported from Egypt in February
after being kept in a squalid military camp with his 68-year-old
mother, who has a heart condition, and his cousin, who has cancer.
Hassan, who asked for his name to be changed, like all of the Sudanese
refugees quoted in this story, said he escaped the capital city,
Khartoum, earlier in the year after his house was invaded and his
brother was killed by RSF fighters. Following his deportation, he said
he was “unsure if there is still a home awaiting” him.
Sudan’s conflict has created one of the world's largest displacement
crises, with nearly nine million people uprooted over the past year.
Two million people have fled to neighbouring states, including more
than half a million who have crossed into Egypt.
Egyptian authorities have taken various measures to restrict Sudanese
from entering legally, despite an agreement guaranteeing freedom of
movement between the countries. Most refugees are now forced to use
smugglers to enter, even as they risk being detained for irregular
entry or injured in dangerous mountain passages.
The UN’s refugee agency (UNHCR) and the Global Detention Project have
both documented pushbacks, yet reporters from The New Humanitarian and
the Refugees Platform are the first to comprehensively investigate how
the deportation system is operating, the facilities being used for
detention, and how refugees are mistreated.
Over six months, reporters spoke to 15 deported refugees and
interviewed Egyptian lawyers, government officials, and local rights
organisations. Reporters also obtained internal police, military, and
public prosecutor records, and used photographs, videos, and satellite
images to confirm the presence of half a dozen military bases whose
locations are mostly unknown and which are being used as detention
centres without legal approvals.
The interviews and documents reveal a systematic, nationwide effort to
deny Sudanese refugees the right to claim asylum. The campaign
involves multiple components of the Egyptian security apparatus as
well as other agencies of the government, which had not responded to
requests for comment by the time of publication.
Some refugees told reporters that Egyptian border guard forces had
shot at them in desert areas, and then arrested and deported them
without any legal process. Others said they were rounded up in towns
and cities and accused by security authorities of spurious offences,
including smuggling, being part of a criminal smuggling group, or
“causing serious harm” to Egypt.
Refugees and lawyers said children, elderly people, and individuals
who had suffered serious injuries during their journeys into the
country were among those deported, as were Sudanese who had registered
with UNHCR. In one case, a lawyer described an individual who was
deported despite having refugee status.
The military bases that reporters geolocated include places where
Egyptian rights defenders and critics have died or been disappeared in
the past by security agencies. Refugees described facilities with
rodent infestations and overflowing sewage. One refugee said they were
detained for 70 days in a base and allowed out just once.
“All of the prisoners' mental states were severely affected,” said
31-year-old Mahmoud, who was detained on a Cairo-bound bus earlier
this year having escaped fighting in Khartoum. “For some, the prospect
of deportation to a country at war was better than remaining in such
dire circumstances.”
Dangerous journeys and mass deportations
Egypt shares deep historical ties with Sudan and has long been home to
millions of Sudanese migrants. The government has taken the side of
the army in the current conflict, yet refugees have faced growing
hostility by Egyptian politicians and members of the public amid a
deepening economic crisis in the country.
Entry restrictions for Sudanese have been tightened over the past
year. Initially, men between 16 and 50 were prevented from entering
unless they had a visa issued by Egyptian consulates in Sudan. This
policy was then extended to cover all Sudanese citizens, most of whom
turned to smugglers due to long visa processing times.
Smugglers take refugees through the desert, on a long, bumpy trip that
crosses mountains, rocky outcroppings, and military checkpoints.
Refugees are packed by smugglers onto the back of pick-up trucks,
having to cling onto ropes to avoid falling out and use surgical masks
to keep out the choking dust.
It is unclear how many refugees have been detained and deported for
irregular entry over the past year, though the Global Detention
Project and UNHCR have recorded or reported on thousands of cases
between them.
In addition to the 15 deported refugees who spoke to The New
Humanitarian and the Refugees Platform, reporters were able to confirm
two dozen more cases through interviews with the relatives and friends
of deported refugees, and another 44 cases through a database shared
by a lawyer from the Egyptian Commision for Rights and Freedom, a
civil society group that monitors human rights violations.
Reporters also obtained internal police, military, and public
prosecutor files on nearly 200 other refugees who were arrested and
detained by authorities. One file described the arrest of 16 people,
including a one-year-old child; another detailed the detention of 14
people, including a girl aged 10. Most arrests targeted Sudanese
citizens and Egyptian drivers, though one case involved six people
from South Sudan.
The majority of the cases investigated by reporters involved refugees
detained in southern Egypt, either shortly after crossing the border
or after arriving in the first main towns in the south. However,
reporters also spoke to the relatives of several refugees who were
arrested while conducting their daily business in the northern cities
of Cairo and Alexandria and later deported, suggesting the crackdown
is nationwide.
“This feeling is looming over us,” said 34-year-old Ahmed, who entered
Egypt irregularly in December and has been staying in Cairo for the
past five months. “I rarely get out of the house. I only make short
trips to get food and then return promptly.”
Refugees said authorities carried out mass deportations, with buses
taking hundreds of people to border crossings. Three said border
guards or aid workers gave them bags of food, drinks, and hygiene
supplies. The bags had printed logos of the World Food Programme and
USAID, according to pictures shared with reporters. Refugees also said
the towns they were deported to lacked accommodation and basic
services.
“When they told us that we would be deported to Sudan, the children
cried because the soldiers lied to them and they were afraid of
returning in light of the war,” said Nasifa, who was deported in late
January. She described having an asthma attack while detained in a
ramshackle military base and said soldiers did not bring her medicine.
Arbitrary detentions and forced returns of migrants, refugees, and
asylum seekers are common in Egypt, with previous campaigns by
security forces also targeting citizens of Eritrea and South Sudan.
Human rights groups say the crackdowns are hard to document because
authorities do not publicly release detention and deportation data.
The campaigns have been carried out while government and security
forces have received support from European states. The support is
motivated by Europe’s desire to stem migration from the country, which
is a transit route for individuals wanting to cross the Mediterranean,
and is also producing a growing number of its own migrants.
Experts said state abuses against refugees and migrants are likely to
increase as a result of the new $8 billion EU funding package, which
includes more than $200 million for migration control. The deal is
part of a part of a broader EU approach of partnering with third
countries – many with poor human rights records – to reduce migration.
“These agreements are unlikely to stem the flow [of migrants],” said
Hossam el-Hamalawy, an Egyptian journalist and scholar who researches
the country’s military and security services. “Instead, they may
exacerbate casualties and further empower the already dominant
military, which lies at the root of many issues in Egypt.”
Reporters contacted the EU’s external affairs spokesperson on 24
April, asking for comment on the findings of the investigation and
whether it would impact the new partnership with Egypt, but did not
receive a response.
Torture, car chases, and rapid returns
The refugees detained in southern Egypt are handled differently
depending on whether they are intercepted close to the border or
arrested in towns and cities, according to witness testimonies,
interviews with lawyers and government officials, and internal
military, police, and public prosecutor documents.
Refugees are especially vulnerable to abuse if they are intercepted
near border areas, which are under military jurisdiction across Egypt.
The areas are patrolled by border guard forces, which are a key part
of the Egyptian military. Access, including for humanitarian and human
rights groups, requires permits from military authorities.
Several lawyers and border guard sources said Sudanese refugees
detained in these areas are rapidly deported by border guard forces
without being registered, and without any legal process. The sources
said this is not in keeping with how border guards used to handle
refugees and migrants intercepted in border areas.
“Previously, deportations occurred following the conclusion of a
military trial and referral to the appropriate authority,” said a
military officer who has served in the border guards for five years.
“However, we are witnessing a new trend where individuals detained are
neither officially registered nor presented before the court.”
Four refugees told reporters that border guard forces ambushed them in
the desert, with three recounting being pursued by military vehicles,
and three claiming that guards shot at their vehicles or in the air,
causing panic. Two refugees also described their Egyptian drivers
being tortured and beaten by border guards after being caught.
Amina, a refugee who crossed the border in February with 13 others,
said her smuggler driver crashed into a tree after border guards
engaged them in a 30-minute car chase through mountains. Amina said
the driver of the vehicle fled after the crash, but his teenage
assistant was caught and then tortured by a border guard officer. The
officer forced the teenager to remove his clothes, kicked him, hung
him with a rope, and penetrated his rectum with a stick until he bled,
Amina said.
“I said to the girls with me: ‘You experienced the war and saw
atrocities, so do not look at what is happening’,” Amina told
reporters. She added that the border guards insulted the group of
refugees before taking them into detention.
Amina’s experience is unlikely to be unique. The New Humanitarian and
the Refugees Platform analysed local media reports, finding 13 car
crashes mostly involving Sudanese nationals travelling on the same
southern roads that refugees are taking. More than 160 people were
injured and 20 died in the crashes – which occurred between May 2023
and February 2024 – though the reports all describe the incidents as
accidents.
Reporters also obtained internal police and public prosecutor
documents that detailed three car crashes, one of which claimed
several lives. The survivors mentioned in the documents do not accuse
border guards of causing the crashes, but the cases have not been
transparently investigated and unidentified bodies are not being
handled with care, according to a well-placed lawyer in Aswan, the
largest city in southern Egypt.
The lawyer, who asked not to be named, citing the risk of reprisals
from the government, said civilian police and public prosecutors have
been asked to investigate certain crashes but lack the authority to do
so when they occur in areas where the military has jurisdiction.
Investigations and ‘false accusations’
Refugees who pass through border areas undetected still risk being
intercepted. This can happen on the streets, at bus and train stations
in southern cities like Aswan, or during the 1,000-kilometre journey
north to Cairo or Alexandria, where refugees can access UNHCR offices
to register themselves.
Unlike those intercepted along the border, refugees arrested in these
areas are not immediately deported. However, internal government
documents and interviews with refugees show how they face Kafkaesque
investigations without access to lawyers and which result in
deportation no matter the outcome.
Reporters obtained files on nearly 200 refugees who faced
investigations. The files include internal arrest reports;
investigations conducted by police, border guards, the Mabahith secret
police agency, and the Department of Combating Illegal Migration and
Human Trafficking; and decisions taken by public prosecutors.
In the investigation documents, refugees are often accused of being
part of smuggling groups or are labelled as “suspected outlaws”
responsible for “causing serious harm to the dignity and reputation of
Egypt”. The language and allegations are identical in several
different documents, which local lawyers said indicates that the
charges are premeditated.
Many of the refugees were brought in front of a public prosecutor, yet
guilty verdicts appear to be rare: In 34 cases where reporters
obtained documents detailing public prosecutor decisions, the
proceedings all ended with prosecutor statements calling for the
release of the accused because of a lack of evidence.
Following the release decisions, refugees are handed over to security
agencies, according to lawyers and refugee testimonies. They then have
deportation orders processed against them anyway, raising questions as
to why they are being put through the proceedings in the first place.
Throughout the process, refugees are consistently denied legal defence
and the chance to initiate asylum procedures, said Mahmoud, the
31-year-old from Khartoum. He said he was detained in mid-January and
accused by secret police of smuggling offences.
“We've endured injustice and false accusations without the opportunity
to defend ourselves or contact a lawyer,” Mahmoud told reporters.
“This is despite authorities being aware of the perilous journey we
have undertaken in pursuit of asylum in Egypt.”
Since his deportation, Mahmoud said he has been “tormented” by the
question of why refugees fleeing a war zone are being punished. Still,
he said he considers himself fortunate to have survived, given that
others endured “even harsher experiences along the same journey”.
Rodents, sewage, and stifling heat
Reporters identified six of the main military bases where refugees are
being detained. Some former detainees provided coordinates of the
facilities, while in other cases reporters matched Google Earth and
Maxar satellite images with open source photographs and videos of the
sites, and with verbal descriptions from refugees.
The facilities verified are all in military-controlled bases in the
southern Aswan and Red Sea governorates. Five are operated by border
guard forces under the control of the Ministry of Defence, and one is
operated by a police unit under the Ministry of Interior.
None of the bases are designated as official detention centres by the
Ministry of Interior, which is a legal requirement, according to three
local lawyers who asked not to be named because of the risk of
reprisals. They said the detentions are therefore illegal under
Egyptian law.
Satellite images for four of the facilities show pick-up vehicles of
the kind that refugees said are used by smugglers. In one facility,
over 200 cars are visible, while in pictures of another – taken in
December and March – the number of cars increases. The images support
the conclusion that the facilities are housing refugees and that
border guards are engaged in large-scale anti-refugee and
anti-smuggling operations.
All the former detainees said they were denied access to lawyers and
UNHCR workers, and that security forces requested their phones, though
some were able to hide them. Only one said they were able to speak to
relatives during their detention period.
Videos, photographs, and refugee testimonies reveal harrowing
conditions inside the bases, which The New Humanitarian and the
Refugees Platform are identifying in order to provide information that
could be useful for the relatives of missing refugees.
Nasifa, the refugee deported in January, stayed in a place that
reporters verified as the Aswan border guard base. She said refugees
were held in a part of the facility that looked like “a horse stable”,
and that space was so cramped that new arrivals were put out in a cold
courtyard. Among the detained refugees was a woman suffering from
bleeding, another with high blood pressure, and a man with throat
cancer, Nasifa said.
Amina, the refugee involved in the car crash, said she stayed in a
“very bad” facility verified by reporters as the Abu Ramad military
base. Amina said there was no light, insufficient water, and a
bathroom without a door. She said she asked for diabetes medication
from soldiers but was not given any during her detention.
Three refugees said they stayed inside a facility that reporters
verified as the al-Shallal base, which is managed by a police unit
known as the Central Security Forces. They said the base is being used
for refugees detained outside of border areas, and that brief family
visits were occasionally allowed.
Mahmoud, the refugee accused of smuggling, said he stayed in
al-Shallal for 70 days. He said hundreds of people were packed into
small spaces, and that many were suffering from respiratory infections
and skin diseases due to outbreaks of lice and ticks. “It is like a
grave,” Mahmoud said. “The lack of sunlight, coupled with the closed
doors, created an environment conducive to the spread of diseases.”
Another facility identified and geolocated by reporters is Abu Simbel
military base. Former detainees, lawyers, and local government
officials said refugees are transferred to the base from other
military camps ahead of them being deported through the nearby Ashkit
border crossing.
Nasifa said she was transferred to Abu Simbel from the Aswan border
guard base. She described overcrowding, sewage overflowing in front of
a kitchen, and women and children with food poisoning. She said a
pregnant woman in labour was left on the floor for 90 minutes without
medical help. The day after her arrival she said buses brought dozens
more refugees to the camp, all of whom were awaiting deportation.
Nowhere to go
Interviews with refugees and other sources identified two key places
where refugees are being deported from: the Ras Hadaraba crossing, for
refugees intercepted in the disputed Hala'ib Triangle; and Ashkit, a
busy crossing where deported refugees are sent to the adjacent town of
Wadi Halfa.
Seven refugees said they were transported to the border crossings
alongside hundreds of others and then handed over to Sudanese
authorities. Their accounts are backed up by a social media video of a
mass deportation that has been geolocated and verified by reporters.
Two refugees said local aid workers gave them humanitarian support on
the border, though others said they were given no assistance, and some
said they were even asked to pay for their own deportation by Egyptian
authorities.
Several refugees deported to Wadi Halfa said they stayed put in the
border town, which has an Egyptian consulate and has attracted tens of
thousands of people seeking visas over the past year. Several dozen
have succumbed to dehydration, heat stroke, and infections while
waiting for visas, according to local hospital records shared with
reporters by a human rights activist.
Amina, the refugee involved in the car crash, said she was deported
via Ras Hadaraba in early March. She said Sudanese soldiers picked her
and 200 others up at the border, and then drove them to the eastern
city of Port Sudan in tractors usually used to transport cattle. They
were given sandwiches and water on arrival in Port Sudan but had no
accommodation, Amina said.
Despite her ordeal, Amina did not stay in Port Sudan for long. She
soon contacted smugglers and set off again for Egypt, this time
successfully reaching Cairo. She said Egyptian soldiers had even
encouraged her to make the journey again: For every 30-40 vehicles
that cross the border, “we catch three or four”, the soldiers told
her.
After being deported to Sudan's remote northern border region in late
January, Nasifa told reporters she had no way of returning to her home
state of Al-Jazira, where RSF forces have reportedly killed hundreds
of civilians in recent months. Yet she said risking her life with
smugglers in the desert to get back into Egypt isn’t an option either.
“The situation in Sudan might be dire enough to make survival
impossible,” Nasifa told The New Humanitarian and the Refugees
Platform. “But nobody would venture out under these circumstances.”
Edited by Philip Kleinfeld.
https://www.thenewhumanitarian.org/investigations/2024/04/25/exclusive-inside-egypt-secret-scheme-detain-deport-thousands-sudan-refugees?
END
______________________
John Ashworth
ashwor...@gmail.com
+254 725 926 297 (Kenya mobile, WhatsApp and Signal)
PO Box 403 - 00206, Kiserian, Kenya
‘I pleaded with the soldiers, but they refused to help us.’
About this investigation: Last summer, the Refugees Platform in Egypt,
a civil society organisation that defends human rights, contacted The
New Humanitarian to share evidence that the Egyptian military was
carrying out large-scale deportations of Sudanese refugees. Reporters
substantiated the allegations by interviewing dozens of refugees,
lawyers, and right groups, obtaining documents from inside secretive
government agencies, and through open source investigative techniques.
Sara Creta and Nour Khalil
The New Humanitarian
25 April 2024
ASWAN, Egypt
Thousands of Sudanese refugees who escaped to neighbouring Egypt have
been detained by Egyptian authorities in a network of secret military
bases, and then deported back to their war-torn country often without
the chance to claim asylum, an investigation by The New Humanitarian
and the Refugees Platform in Egypt has found.
The pushbacks uncovered by reporters contravene refugee conventions
that Egypt has ratified, and are being carried out as the EU has
pledged billions of dollars to Cairo in exchange for the government
curtailing migration to Europe, a deal that critics say could make
European countries complicit in the abuses taking place.
The pushbacks are also being enforced amid a worsening of the
year-long war between the Sudanese army and its former ally, the
powerful paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF). The fighting is
expanding into new parts of the country, leaving tens of thousands of
people dead, and triggering warnings of a looming famine.
“I pleaded with the soldiers, explaining that my mother was gravely
ill and urgently needed medical attention, but they refused to help
us,” said 25-year-old Hassan, who was deported from Egypt in February
after being kept in a squalid military camp with his 68-year-old
mother, who has a heart condition, and his cousin, who has cancer.
Hassan, who asked for his name to be changed, like all of the Sudanese
refugees quoted in this story, said he escaped the capital city,
Khartoum, earlier in the year after his house was invaded and his
brother was killed by RSF fighters. Following his deportation, he said
he was “unsure if there is still a home awaiting” him.
Sudan’s conflict has created one of the world's largest displacement
crises, with nearly nine million people uprooted over the past year.
Two million people have fled to neighbouring states, including more
than half a million who have crossed into Egypt.
Egyptian authorities have taken various measures to restrict Sudanese
from entering legally, despite an agreement guaranteeing freedom of
movement between the countries. Most refugees are now forced to use
smugglers to enter, even as they risk being detained for irregular
entry or injured in dangerous mountain passages.
The UN’s refugee agency (UNHCR) and the Global Detention Project have
both documented pushbacks, yet reporters from The New Humanitarian and
the Refugees Platform are the first to comprehensively investigate how
the deportation system is operating, the facilities being used for
detention, and how refugees are mistreated.
Over six months, reporters spoke to 15 deported refugees and
interviewed Egyptian lawyers, government officials, and local rights
organisations. Reporters also obtained internal police, military, and
public prosecutor records, and used photographs, videos, and satellite
images to confirm the presence of half a dozen military bases whose
locations are mostly unknown and which are being used as detention
centres without legal approvals.
The interviews and documents reveal a systematic, nationwide effort to
deny Sudanese refugees the right to claim asylum. The campaign
involves multiple components of the Egyptian security apparatus as
well as other agencies of the government, which had not responded to
requests for comment by the time of publication.
Some refugees told reporters that Egyptian border guard forces had
shot at them in desert areas, and then arrested and deported them
without any legal process. Others said they were rounded up in towns
and cities and accused by security authorities of spurious offences,
including smuggling, being part of a criminal smuggling group, or
“causing serious harm” to Egypt.
Refugees and lawyers said children, elderly people, and individuals
who had suffered serious injuries during their journeys into the
country were among those deported, as were Sudanese who had registered
with UNHCR. In one case, a lawyer described an individual who was
deported despite having refugee status.
The military bases that reporters geolocated include places where
Egyptian rights defenders and critics have died or been disappeared in
the past by security agencies. Refugees described facilities with
rodent infestations and overflowing sewage. One refugee said they were
detained for 70 days in a base and allowed out just once.
“All of the prisoners' mental states were severely affected,” said
31-year-old Mahmoud, who was detained on a Cairo-bound bus earlier
this year having escaped fighting in Khartoum. “For some, the prospect
of deportation to a country at war was better than remaining in such
dire circumstances.”
Dangerous journeys and mass deportations
Egypt shares deep historical ties with Sudan and has long been home to
millions of Sudanese migrants. The government has taken the side of
the army in the current conflict, yet refugees have faced growing
hostility by Egyptian politicians and members of the public amid a
deepening economic crisis in the country.
Entry restrictions for Sudanese have been tightened over the past
year. Initially, men between 16 and 50 were prevented from entering
unless they had a visa issued by Egyptian consulates in Sudan. This
policy was then extended to cover all Sudanese citizens, most of whom
turned to smugglers due to long visa processing times.
Smugglers take refugees through the desert, on a long, bumpy trip that
crosses mountains, rocky outcroppings, and military checkpoints.
Refugees are packed by smugglers onto the back of pick-up trucks,
having to cling onto ropes to avoid falling out and use surgical masks
to keep out the choking dust.
It is unclear how many refugees have been detained and deported for
irregular entry over the past year, though the Global Detention
Project and UNHCR have recorded or reported on thousands of cases
between them.
In addition to the 15 deported refugees who spoke to The New
Humanitarian and the Refugees Platform, reporters were able to confirm
two dozen more cases through interviews with the relatives and friends
of deported refugees, and another 44 cases through a database shared
by a lawyer from the Egyptian Commision for Rights and Freedom, a
civil society group that monitors human rights violations.
Reporters also obtained internal police, military, and public
prosecutor files on nearly 200 other refugees who were arrested and
detained by authorities. One file described the arrest of 16 people,
including a one-year-old child; another detailed the detention of 14
people, including a girl aged 10. Most arrests targeted Sudanese
citizens and Egyptian drivers, though one case involved six people
from South Sudan.
The majority of the cases investigated by reporters involved refugees
detained in southern Egypt, either shortly after crossing the border
or after arriving in the first main towns in the south. However,
reporters also spoke to the relatives of several refugees who were
arrested while conducting their daily business in the northern cities
of Cairo and Alexandria and later deported, suggesting the crackdown
is nationwide.
“This feeling is looming over us,” said 34-year-old Ahmed, who entered
Egypt irregularly in December and has been staying in Cairo for the
past five months. “I rarely get out of the house. I only make short
trips to get food and then return promptly.”
Refugees said authorities carried out mass deportations, with buses
taking hundreds of people to border crossings. Three said border
guards or aid workers gave them bags of food, drinks, and hygiene
supplies. The bags had printed logos of the World Food Programme and
USAID, according to pictures shared with reporters. Refugees also said
the towns they were deported to lacked accommodation and basic
services.
“When they told us that we would be deported to Sudan, the children
cried because the soldiers lied to them and they were afraid of
returning in light of the war,” said Nasifa, who was deported in late
January. She described having an asthma attack while detained in a
ramshackle military base and said soldiers did not bring her medicine.
Arbitrary detentions and forced returns of migrants, refugees, and
asylum seekers are common in Egypt, with previous campaigns by
security forces also targeting citizens of Eritrea and South Sudan.
Human rights groups say the crackdowns are hard to document because
authorities do not publicly release detention and deportation data.
The campaigns have been carried out while government and security
forces have received support from European states. The support is
motivated by Europe’s desire to stem migration from the country, which
is a transit route for individuals wanting to cross the Mediterranean,
and is also producing a growing number of its own migrants.
Experts said state abuses against refugees and migrants are likely to
increase as a result of the new $8 billion EU funding package, which
includes more than $200 million for migration control. The deal is
part of a part of a broader EU approach of partnering with third
countries – many with poor human rights records – to reduce migration.
“These agreements are unlikely to stem the flow [of migrants],” said
Hossam el-Hamalawy, an Egyptian journalist and scholar who researches
the country’s military and security services. “Instead, they may
exacerbate casualties and further empower the already dominant
military, which lies at the root of many issues in Egypt.”
Reporters contacted the EU’s external affairs spokesperson on 24
April, asking for comment on the findings of the investigation and
whether it would impact the new partnership with Egypt, but did not
receive a response.
Torture, car chases, and rapid returns
The refugees detained in southern Egypt are handled differently
depending on whether they are intercepted close to the border or
arrested in towns and cities, according to witness testimonies,
interviews with lawyers and government officials, and internal
military, police, and public prosecutor documents.
Refugees are especially vulnerable to abuse if they are intercepted
near border areas, which are under military jurisdiction across Egypt.
The areas are patrolled by border guard forces, which are a key part
of the Egyptian military. Access, including for humanitarian and human
rights groups, requires permits from military authorities.
Several lawyers and border guard sources said Sudanese refugees
detained in these areas are rapidly deported by border guard forces
without being registered, and without any legal process. The sources
said this is not in keeping with how border guards used to handle
refugees and migrants intercepted in border areas.
“Previously, deportations occurred following the conclusion of a
military trial and referral to the appropriate authority,” said a
military officer who has served in the border guards for five years.
“However, we are witnessing a new trend where individuals detained are
neither officially registered nor presented before the court.”
Four refugees told reporters that border guard forces ambushed them in
the desert, with three recounting being pursued by military vehicles,
and three claiming that guards shot at their vehicles or in the air,
causing panic. Two refugees also described their Egyptian drivers
being tortured and beaten by border guards after being caught.
Amina, a refugee who crossed the border in February with 13 others,
said her smuggler driver crashed into a tree after border guards
engaged them in a 30-minute car chase through mountains. Amina said
the driver of the vehicle fled after the crash, but his teenage
assistant was caught and then tortured by a border guard officer. The
officer forced the teenager to remove his clothes, kicked him, hung
him with a rope, and penetrated his rectum with a stick until he bled,
Amina said.
“I said to the girls with me: ‘You experienced the war and saw
atrocities, so do not look at what is happening’,” Amina told
reporters. She added that the border guards insulted the group of
refugees before taking them into detention.
Amina’s experience is unlikely to be unique. The New Humanitarian and
the Refugees Platform analysed local media reports, finding 13 car
crashes mostly involving Sudanese nationals travelling on the same
southern roads that refugees are taking. More than 160 people were
injured and 20 died in the crashes – which occurred between May 2023
and February 2024 – though the reports all describe the incidents as
accidents.
Reporters also obtained internal police and public prosecutor
documents that detailed three car crashes, one of which claimed
several lives. The survivors mentioned in the documents do not accuse
border guards of causing the crashes, but the cases have not been
transparently investigated and unidentified bodies are not being
handled with care, according to a well-placed lawyer in Aswan, the
largest city in southern Egypt.
The lawyer, who asked not to be named, citing the risk of reprisals
from the government, said civilian police and public prosecutors have
been asked to investigate certain crashes but lack the authority to do
so when they occur in areas where the military has jurisdiction.
Investigations and ‘false accusations’
Refugees who pass through border areas undetected still risk being
intercepted. This can happen on the streets, at bus and train stations
in southern cities like Aswan, or during the 1,000-kilometre journey
north to Cairo or Alexandria, where refugees can access UNHCR offices
to register themselves.
Unlike those intercepted along the border, refugees arrested in these
areas are not immediately deported. However, internal government
documents and interviews with refugees show how they face Kafkaesque
investigations without access to lawyers and which result in
deportation no matter the outcome.
Reporters obtained files on nearly 200 refugees who faced
investigations. The files include internal arrest reports;
investigations conducted by police, border guards, the Mabahith secret
police agency, and the Department of Combating Illegal Migration and
Human Trafficking; and decisions taken by public prosecutors.
In the investigation documents, refugees are often accused of being
part of smuggling groups or are labelled as “suspected outlaws”
responsible for “causing serious harm to the dignity and reputation of
Egypt”. The language and allegations are identical in several
different documents, which local lawyers said indicates that the
charges are premeditated.
Many of the refugees were brought in front of a public prosecutor, yet
guilty verdicts appear to be rare: In 34 cases where reporters
obtained documents detailing public prosecutor decisions, the
proceedings all ended with prosecutor statements calling for the
release of the accused because of a lack of evidence.
Following the release decisions, refugees are handed over to security
agencies, according to lawyers and refugee testimonies. They then have
deportation orders processed against them anyway, raising questions as
to why they are being put through the proceedings in the first place.
Throughout the process, refugees are consistently denied legal defence
and the chance to initiate asylum procedures, said Mahmoud, the
31-year-old from Khartoum. He said he was detained in mid-January and
accused by secret police of smuggling offences.
“We've endured injustice and false accusations without the opportunity
to defend ourselves or contact a lawyer,” Mahmoud told reporters.
“This is despite authorities being aware of the perilous journey we
have undertaken in pursuit of asylum in Egypt.”
Since his deportation, Mahmoud said he has been “tormented” by the
question of why refugees fleeing a war zone are being punished. Still,
he said he considers himself fortunate to have survived, given that
others endured “even harsher experiences along the same journey”.
Rodents, sewage, and stifling heat
Reporters identified six of the main military bases where refugees are
being detained. Some former detainees provided coordinates of the
facilities, while in other cases reporters matched Google Earth and
Maxar satellite images with open source photographs and videos of the
sites, and with verbal descriptions from refugees.
The facilities verified are all in military-controlled bases in the
southern Aswan and Red Sea governorates. Five are operated by border
guard forces under the control of the Ministry of Defence, and one is
operated by a police unit under the Ministry of Interior.
None of the bases are designated as official detention centres by the
Ministry of Interior, which is a legal requirement, according to three
local lawyers who asked not to be named because of the risk of
reprisals. They said the detentions are therefore illegal under
Egyptian law.
Satellite images for four of the facilities show pick-up vehicles of
the kind that refugees said are used by smugglers. In one facility,
over 200 cars are visible, while in pictures of another – taken in
December and March – the number of cars increases. The images support
the conclusion that the facilities are housing refugees and that
border guards are engaged in large-scale anti-refugee and
anti-smuggling operations.
All the former detainees said they were denied access to lawyers and
UNHCR workers, and that security forces requested their phones, though
some were able to hide them. Only one said they were able to speak to
relatives during their detention period.
Videos, photographs, and refugee testimonies reveal harrowing
conditions inside the bases, which The New Humanitarian and the
Refugees Platform are identifying in order to provide information that
could be useful for the relatives of missing refugees.
Nasifa, the refugee deported in January, stayed in a place that
reporters verified as the Aswan border guard base. She said refugees
were held in a part of the facility that looked like “a horse stable”,
and that space was so cramped that new arrivals were put out in a cold
courtyard. Among the detained refugees was a woman suffering from
bleeding, another with high blood pressure, and a man with throat
cancer, Nasifa said.
Amina, the refugee involved in the car crash, said she stayed in a
“very bad” facility verified by reporters as the Abu Ramad military
base. Amina said there was no light, insufficient water, and a
bathroom without a door. She said she asked for diabetes medication
from soldiers but was not given any during her detention.
Three refugees said they stayed inside a facility that reporters
verified as the al-Shallal base, which is managed by a police unit
known as the Central Security Forces. They said the base is being used
for refugees detained outside of border areas, and that brief family
visits were occasionally allowed.
Mahmoud, the refugee accused of smuggling, said he stayed in
al-Shallal for 70 days. He said hundreds of people were packed into
small spaces, and that many were suffering from respiratory infections
and skin diseases due to outbreaks of lice and ticks. “It is like a
grave,” Mahmoud said. “The lack of sunlight, coupled with the closed
doors, created an environment conducive to the spread of diseases.”
Another facility identified and geolocated by reporters is Abu Simbel
military base. Former detainees, lawyers, and local government
officials said refugees are transferred to the base from other
military camps ahead of them being deported through the nearby Ashkit
border crossing.
Nasifa said she was transferred to Abu Simbel from the Aswan border
guard base. She described overcrowding, sewage overflowing in front of
a kitchen, and women and children with food poisoning. She said a
pregnant woman in labour was left on the floor for 90 minutes without
medical help. The day after her arrival she said buses brought dozens
more refugees to the camp, all of whom were awaiting deportation.
Nowhere to go
Interviews with refugees and other sources identified two key places
where refugees are being deported from: the Ras Hadaraba crossing, for
refugees intercepted in the disputed Hala'ib Triangle; and Ashkit, a
busy crossing where deported refugees are sent to the adjacent town of
Wadi Halfa.
Seven refugees said they were transported to the border crossings
alongside hundreds of others and then handed over to Sudanese
authorities. Their accounts are backed up by a social media video of a
mass deportation that has been geolocated and verified by reporters.
Two refugees said local aid workers gave them humanitarian support on
the border, though others said they were given no assistance, and some
said they were even asked to pay for their own deportation by Egyptian
authorities.
Several refugees deported to Wadi Halfa said they stayed put in the
border town, which has an Egyptian consulate and has attracted tens of
thousands of people seeking visas over the past year. Several dozen
have succumbed to dehydration, heat stroke, and infections while
waiting for visas, according to local hospital records shared with
reporters by a human rights activist.
Amina, the refugee involved in the car crash, said she was deported
via Ras Hadaraba in early March. She said Sudanese soldiers picked her
and 200 others up at the border, and then drove them to the eastern
city of Port Sudan in tractors usually used to transport cattle. They
were given sandwiches and water on arrival in Port Sudan but had no
accommodation, Amina said.
Despite her ordeal, Amina did not stay in Port Sudan for long. She
soon contacted smugglers and set off again for Egypt, this time
successfully reaching Cairo. She said Egyptian soldiers had even
encouraged her to make the journey again: For every 30-40 vehicles
that cross the border, “we catch three or four”, the soldiers told
her.
After being deported to Sudan's remote northern border region in late
January, Nasifa told reporters she had no way of returning to her home
state of Al-Jazira, where RSF forces have reportedly killed hundreds
of civilians in recent months. Yet she said risking her life with
smugglers in the desert to get back into Egypt isn’t an option either.
“The situation in Sudan might be dire enough to make survival
impossible,” Nasifa told The New Humanitarian and the Refugees
Platform. “But nobody would venture out under these circumstances.”
Edited by Philip Kleinfeld.
https://www.thenewhumanitarian.org/investigations/2024/04/25/exclusive-inside-egypt-secret-scheme-detain-deport-thousands-sudan-refugees?
END
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John Ashworth
ashwor...@gmail.com
+254 725 926 297 (Kenya mobile, WhatsApp and Signal)
PO Box 403 - 00206, Kiserian, Kenya
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