LAS QORAY, Somalia Feb 23 (Garowe Online) – Nearly 120 Ethiopian migrants were dumped off of north Somalia’s coastal town of Las Qoray and informed that they were on Yemeni shores, local sources reported Saturday.
Las Qoray residents awoke today to find the migrants near the coast, including women and children.
A local source told Garowe Online that the migrants are from Ethiopia, and most belong to that country’s Oromo ethnic group.
The migrants told Las Qoray locals that they were thrown overboard when they “saw lights” in the distance. The armed smugglers apparently told the migrants that they had reached the shores of Yemen, a destination for migrants fleeing the Horn of Africa region.
The boat was loaded in a small village east of the port city of Bossaso, the commercial hub of the Puntland regional autonomy, the migrants said.
The boat stayed on the high seas for many hours and then got close to the shore during the night, when the unsuspecting migrants could be easily tricked.
“They [migrants] told us they were thrown overboard,” said a local clan elder who spoke with the Ethiopians. “They looked tired and were in very bad shape.”
The Bossaso-to-Yemen smuggling route kills hundreds of African migrants each year. Earlier this week, at least 37 people, mostly Somalis and Ethiopians, died in the Gulf of Aden as they attempted to reach the Yemeni coast.
Las Qoray is located in Sanaag, a region disputed for years between Puntland and the neighboring self-declared Republic of Somaliland.
But since last year, Las Qoray and much of Sanaag region has remained in the hands of local clan leaders who established the Maakhir State of Somalia, which considers itself part of federal Somalia but independent of both Somaliland and Puntland.
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FORUM | 2 Comments
My dear Ethiopian migrants,
Las Qoray is not Yemen, and Yemen is not Las Qoray. Once again those immoral armed smugglers have cheated you as your Woyanne regime has failed you and put you and your children into quagmire. It is time to blame not the armed smugglers only but also the Meles and his merciless advisors who refused to offer you adequate food and shelter at home. It is not your faults to fall into the hands of such inhumane armed strugglers; rather it is the faults of Meles and his criminal gangs who allow you to suffer in the hands of these cruel and ruthless armed smugglers.
[Reply]
February 24th, 2008 at 11:10 AM
What will be the fate of those 120 Ethiopian migrants left to die without enough food and water at the coastal town of Somalia, a hostile place? Would Meles send an army helicopter to pick them up, bring them home, give them food, water, and medical care? Or would he bring them home and send them to prison? Is there any international food agency nearby that would help these poor Ethiopian souls? I don’t think Meles Seitanawi has a good heart to help these desperate individuals since all of them are assumedly from Oromo region. I’m certain, if there were one Tigrean person among them, Meles would find a way to bring that Tigrean person to safety and leave the rest to perish in that unfriendly environment.
[Reply]
February 24th, 2008 at 3:51 PM