Answer to prayer for Eritrean refugees in Libya 08/07/2010
On Wednesday 7 July, the Italian Government announced it has negotiated the possible release of the detainees in exchange for undertaking “socially useful work”, though it is still not clear what this will entail.

Eritrean refugees sent back from Libya in great danger 01/07/2010
Right now, some 250 highly vulnerable Eritrean refugees are in danger of being forcibly repatriated by Libyan authorities.  CSW learnt that they were herded like cattle into trucks which took them from Misrata prison to a detention centre on the edge of the Sahara desert earlier this week.

Israeli deportations & refugee crisis 06/05/2010
Some 13,000 Eritrean refugees may face forcible repatriation if the Israeli government proceeds with a plan to negotiate with the Eritrean government for their return. Refugees returned to ‘the North Korea of Africa’, as Eritrea is known, are generally jailed in appalling conditions, and can face torture and even death.

Background

Many Eritreans enter Libya in the hope of continuing on to Europe, which they see as a place of safety. While in Libya they are regularly racially abused and physically assualted by the local population. They are also imprisonment by the Libyan authorities in overcrowded detention centres, where conditions are appalling and the abuse continues.

In the past several hundred Eritrean refugees were returned by Libya and disappeared into Eritrea’s infamous prison system. In 2004 a second forced deportation failed when the refugees forced the Libyan pilot of the plane carrying them to Asmara to land in Khartoum Airport.

In June 2008, Egypt forcibly returned around 1,200 Eritrean refugees and asylum seekers, many to detention and torture, even death. Some had already received UNHCR refugee status, yet all were denied access to the UNHCR and to the protection that should be theirs under international law. Upon arrival in Eritrea the majority were reportedly transferred to detention facilities, where around 800 are still held. According to reports, several returnees were shot dead in front of other prisoners to dissuade the watchers from attempting to flee the country.

In mid December 2008, around 100 Eritrean men, women and children were imprisoned in Northern Sinai after being forcibly returned to Egypt by the Israeli Army as they sought to enter that country through the border with Egypt.  Again, contrary to international law, the UNHCR was denied access to them.  Instead the group was instead visited by Eritrean Embassy officials who documented their details.  Reports indicate that over 80 were gradually transferred elsewhere and forcibly deported in late December and early January.  Those who resisted, including a pregnant woman, were severely assaulted by Egyptian prison guards.