Algeria abandons 13,000 migrants in Sahara
News & Trends •
source63 here in the desert algeria has abandoned more than 13000 people in the past 14 months including pregnant women and children stranding them without food or water and forcing them to walk sometimes at gunpoint under temperatures of up to 118 degrees1 others disoriented and dehydrated wander for days before a u.n. rescue squad can find them1 untold numbers perish along the way nearly all the more than two dozen survivors interviewed by the associated press told of people in their groups who simply could not go on and vanished into the sahara1 women were lying dead men.. other people got missing in the desert because they didnt know the way said janet kamara who was pregnant at the time. everybody was just on their own1 her body still aches from the dead baby she gave birth to during the trek and left behind in the sahara buried in a shallow grave in the molten sand1 blood streaked her legs for days afterward and weeks later her ankles are still swollen. now in arlit niger she is reeling from the time she spent in what she calls the wilderness sleeping in the sand1 quietly in a voice almost devoid of feeling she recalled at least two nights in the open before her group was finally rescued but said she lost track of time1 i lost my son my child said kamara a liberian who ran her own home business selling drinks and food in algeria and was expelled in may1 another woman in her early twenties who was expelled at the same time also went into labor she said. that baby didnt make it either1 in niger where the majority head the lucky ones limp across a desolate 9-mile no-mans-land to assamaka less a town than a collection of unsteady buildings sinking into drifts of sand1 these migrants from across sub-saharan africa mali the gambia guinea ivory coast niger and more are part of the mass migration toward europe some fleeing violence others just hoping to make a living1 a european union spokesperson said the eu was aware of what algeria was doing but that sovereign countries can expel migrants as long as they comply with international law1 unlike niger algeria takes none of the eu money intended to help with the migration crisis although it did receive 111.3 million in aid from europe between 2014 and 20171 algeria provides no figures for the expulsions. but the number of people crossing on foot to niger has been increasing steadily since the international organization for migration started counting in may 2017 when 135 people were dropped at the crossing to as high as 2888 in april 20181 in all according to the iom a total of 11276 men women and children survived the march1 at least another 2500 were forced on a similar trek this year through the sahara into neighboring mali with an unknown number succumbing along the way1 the migrants the ap talked to described being rounded up hundreds at a time crammed into open trucks headed southward for six to eight hours to what is known as point zero then dropped in the desert and pointed in the direction of niger1 they are told to walk sometimes at gunpoint. in early june 217 men women and children were dropped well before reaching point zero fully 18 miles from the nearest source of water according to the iom1 algerias mass expulsions have picked up since october 2017 as the european union renewed pressure on north african countries to head off migrants going north to europe via the mediterranean sea or the barrier fences with spain1