IOM - The African Mirror

Aug

2020

Kenya woman’s ordeal highlights newly identified sex trafficking route

AYENAT MERSIE J's cousin promised her a well-paid job in India as a housekeeper. Instead, she found herself in a brothel until the United Nations brought her home to Kenya when it was alerted to the human trafficking route. "When I heard there were job vacancies in India, I was so happy," said J, asking that only her initial be used to protect her privacy. When she got there, her passport was confiscated and she was forced into sex work to pay off $9,000 her traffickers, fellow East Africans, told her she owed them for her travel and lodging, she…

Aug

2020

By The African Mirror

At least 45 African migrants die off Libya in worst shipwreck of 2020 -UN

NEWS

AT least 45 African migrants and refugees have perished in the Mediterranean Sea in the largest recorded shipwreck off the Libyan coast this year, U.N. agencies said on Wednesday. The U.N. refugee agency UNHCR and the International Organization for Migration (IOM), in a statement disclosing Monday's accident, called for stepping up search and rescue capacity to respond to distress calls. "Some 37 survivors, mainly from Senegal, Mali, Chad and Ghana, were rescued by local fishermen and later detained upon disembarkation," the statement said. "They reported to IOM staff that 45 others, including five children, lost their lives when the vessel's…

Jul

2020

By The African Mirror

Three migrants shot dead in Libya after failed crossing to Europe

NEWS

LIBYAN authorities shot dead three Sudanese migrants trying to flee detention late on Monday, as they disembarked from a failed attempt to cross the Mediterranean to Europe, a U.N. agency said. "Staff from the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in Khums, reported that local authorities started shooting when the migrants attempted to escape from the disembarkation point," IOM said in a statement. Reuters could not immediately reach Libya's interior ministry for comment. The migrants were among 70 disembarking from a vessel that was intercepted and sent back by the Libyan coast guard, one of many such voyages undertaken during the…

Jul

2020

By The African Mirror

Yemen starts forced transfers of Ethiopian migrants, IOM says

COVID-19

TENS of thousands of migrants, mostly Ethiopians, are stranded in Yemen and at least 14,500 have been rounded up and forcibly transferred internally amid fears migrants contribute to the spread of COVID-19, the U.N. migration agency said on Tuesday. Thousands of Saudi-bound Ethiopian workers cross Yemen each month but restrictions aimed at curbing the rapid spread of COVID-19 in the war-ravaged country have cut arrivals. But among those already there, thousands have been bussed or trucked to cities like Aden and Marib where they are now stuck, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) said. "It's a very dire situation when…

Jul

2020

By The African Mirror

After losing jobs, many Sudanese struggle to make ends meet in Egypt

COVID-19

ULF LAESSING AFTER losing his job as house cleaner in Cairo, Sudanese refugee Abdel-Nasser Khamis has been struggling to pay his bills. It's a fate shared by tens of thousands of migrants in Egypt, where the fallout from the coronavirus has hit the economy hard, U.N. officials and aid workers say. Coronavirus lockdowns also cost many Egyptians their jobs. More than a quarter of those who had a job have not been working since the government brought in measures to fight the pandemic, while more than half have been put on shorter hours, the statistics office says. In turn Egyptians…