NIAMEY: Algeria has turned back nearly 20,000 migrants from sub-Saharan Africa to neighboring Niger since January, in often “brutal conditions,” Niamey-based NGO Alarme Phone Sahara told AFP on Monday.
Irregular migrants, including women and children, have since 2014 frequently been pushed back by Algeria, a key transit point for those attempting to cross the Mediterranean Sea to Europe.
Alarme Phone Sahara — which rescues migrants in the vast desert spanning Algeria and Niger — recorded 19,798 people turned back between January and August, its communications officer Moctar Dan Yaye said.
Migrants are often expelled “in brutal conditions” and in the “worst cases, with deadly consequences,” the NGO said in a report published in late August.
“Migrants get arrested during raids on where they live or work in cities, or at the Tunisian border, and are pooled in Tamanrasset (southern Algeria) before being driven in trucks toward Niger,” said Yaye.
Nigeriens are then transported overland to Assamaka, the first Nigerien village on the other side of the border, where they are handled by local authorities.
Other nationals, however, are abandoned at “point zero,” a desert area marking the Algerian-Nigerien border.
From there, they are forced to walk 15 kilometers (nine miles) to Assamaka in extreme temperatures, said Yaye.
Once registered by Nigerien police in Assamaka, migrants are hosted in United Nations and Italian temporary housing centers, before being moved to other centers in northern Niger, Yaye added.
“We hear a lot of stories from migrants involving abuse, violence and confiscation of their belongings by Algerian forces,” he said.
Niger’s junta, which took power last year, in April summoned the Algerian ambassador to Niamey to protest against the “violent nature” of repatriation operations and deportations.
Algiers followed suit, calling in Niamey’s envoy and discarding the allegations as “baseless.”
Since Niger in November repealed a 2015 law that criminalized migrant trafficking, “numerous people have been moving freely” on migration routes “without fearing reprisals” as they did before, the NGO reported.
NGO: Algeria has turned back 20,000 migrants to Niger this year
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NGO: Algeria has turned back 20,000 migrants to Niger this year
- Irregular migrants, including women and children, have since 2014 frequently been pushed back by Algeria
Iran says killed eight militants since attack on police in province bordering Pakistan
- Militants from the Jaish Al-Adl group killed 10 police officers during a raid in Sistan-Baluchistan province on October 26
- Sistan-Baluchistan, which straddles border with Afghanistan and Pakistan, is one of Iran’s most impoverished provinces
TEHRAN: Iran’s military has killed eight militants in an operation in the restive southeast since a deadly attack last month on a police station, state media reported Tuesday.
Militants from the Pakistan-based Jaish Al-Adl group killed 10 police officers during a raid on October 26 in Sistan-Baluchistan province — one of the deadliest attacks in the region in recent months.
Sistan-Baluchistan, which straddles the border with Afghanistan and Pakistan, is one of Iran’s most impoverished provinces.
It has long been a flashpoint for cross-border attacks by separatists and extremists, opposed to the authorities in Iran.
Revolutionary Guards commander Ahmad Shafahi said “a total of eight terrorists have been killed” since the beginning of operations in the province, according to the official IRNA news agency on Tuesday.
“Fourteen other terrorists have been arrested,” including key figures involved in the attack, he said, adding security forces seized weapons and ammunition.
Shortly after the attack in Taftan county, some 1,200 kilometers (745 miles) southeast of the capital Tehran, a report on the Tasnim news agency said four militants had been killed and four others arrested.
Late on Monday, IRNA quoted Guards ground forces commander Mohammad Pakpour as saying the attackers “were not Iranian,” though he did not specify their nationalities.
In early October, at least six people including police officers were killed in two separate attacks in the province.
Jaish Al-Adl said on Telegram they had carried out the attacks.
Formed in 2012 by Baluch separatists, the group is proscribed as a “terrorist organization” by both Iran and the United States.
Over 100 patients to be evacuated from Gaza, WHO says
- The patients will travel in a large convoy on Wednesday via the Kerem Shalom crossing
GENEVA: More than 100 patients including children suffering from trauma injuries and chronic diseases will be evacuated from Gaza on Wednesday in a rare transfer out of the war-ravaged enclave, a World Health Organization official said.
“These are ad hoc measures. What we have requested repeatedly is a sustained medevac (medical evacuation) outside of Gaza,” said Rik Peeperkorn, WHO representative for the Occupied Palestinian Territory, adding that 12,000 people were awaiting transfer.
The patients will travel in a large convoy on Wednesday via the Kerem Shalom crossing with Israel before flying to the United Arab Emirates, he added, and then a portion will travel to Romania.
Iran says two French detainees held in good conditions
- In recent years, Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards have arrested dozens of dual nationals and foreigners, mostly on charges related to espionage and security
DUBAI: Two French citizens detained in Iran since May 2022 are in good health and being held in good detention conditions, Iran’s judiciary spokesperson Asghar Jahangir said on Tuesday, according to state media.
Last month, France’s foreign ministry said the conditions that three of its nationals were being held in by Iran were unacceptable.
“According to the relevant authorities, these two people have good conditions in the detention center and are in good health, so any claim regarding their conditions being abnormal is rejected,” Jahangir said.
The spokesperson was referring to Cecile Koehler and Jacques Paris, who he said were arrested on charges of espionage and will have their next court hearing on Nov. 24.
Jahangir did not mention the third French national detained in Iran. French media have disclosed only his first name, Olivier.
In recent years, Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards have arrested dozens of dual nationals and foreigners, mostly on charges related to espionage and security.
Rights groups have accused Iran of trying to extract concessions from other countries through such arrests.
Israeli strikes in Gaza, West Bank leave dozens dead
- Airstrikes in Gaza kill at least 30, Palestinian medics and media say
- Israeli military says it ‘eliminated terrorists’ in latest operations
CAIRO/QABATIYAH: Israeli airstrikes across the Gaza Strip and West Bank have resulted in significant casualties, as conflict in the region intensifies.
Since Monday night, at least 30 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, with strikes leveling buildings and tightening sieges on northern areas of the enclave, according to Palestinian media and medical sources.
In Beit Lahiya, northern Gaza, two houses were heavily damaged in an airstrike, killing at least 20 people late on Monday, as reported by WAFA and Hamas-linked media. The Gaza health ministry has not immediately verified this toll. Additionally, four people were reported dead in the central town of Al-Zawayda around midnight.
Meanwhile, six more Palestinians died in separate airstrikes on Gaza City and Deir Al-Balah. The Israeli military claimed that its forces had "eliminated terrorists" in central Gaza and Jabalia and uncovered weapons and explosives in the southern area of Rafah, where it had also dismantled "terrorist infrastructure."
Reports from the ground suggest that Israel's tactics aim to clear northern Gaza towns and refugee camps to establish buffer zones, a strategy Israel says has successfully neutralized hundreds of Palestinian fighters in Jabalia over the past month.
More than 43,300 Palestinians have died in Gaza over a year of fighting, and much of the region has been devastated. The conflict initially erupted following Hamas-led attacks on Israel on October 7, 2023, which killed around 1,200 Israelis and resulted in 251 hostages being taken to Gaza.
Violence has also erupted in the occupied West Bank. On Tuesday, Israeli airstrikes killed four Palestinians in separate incidents during two military operations.
In Tammun, near Tubas, two Palestinians died, one of whom was severely mutilated, according to the city’s governor, Ahmad Assad.
The health ministry in Ramallah confirmed the deaths, noting that the identity of one victim remains unverified and that the army is withholding the body.
In a separate airstrike in Qabatiyah near Jenin, two more Palestinian men, aged 40 and 38 and reportedly related, were killed, confirmed Kamal Abu Rubb, governor of Jenin.
The Israeli military did not immediately respond to inquiries about these operations. The West Bank has seen escalating violence since the onset of the Gaza conflict, with at least 754 Palestinians killed in the territory by Israeli forces or settlers, according to the health ministry in Ramallah.
In contrast, Palestinian attacks have claimed 24 Israeli lives during the same period, according to official Israeli sources.
Sudan paramilitaries kill 10 civilians: activists
PORT SUDAN: Ten civilians were killed in the central Sudanese state of Al-Jazira, pro-democracy activists said on Tuesday, in an attack they blamed on the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.
The Madani Resistance Committee, one of hundreds of volunteer groups coordinating aid across the country, said the RSF carried out the killings on Monday night in the village of Barborab, about 85 kilometers (50 miles) northeast of the state capital Wad Madani.
