Libya arrests 81 Migrants From Somalia, Eritrea, Ethiopia

Benghazi – Authorities in eastern Libya said they have arrested 81 migrants from Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Somalia who had escaped from smugglers after failing to reach Europe.

Officials said the migrants would be deported soon.

Ahmed al-Arifi, an official from the department for countering illegal migration in the eastern city of Benghazi said migrants were reported to authorities by an imam at a mosque on the coast to the south of the Libyan city of Benghazi.

Al-Arifi said:“they were arrested in the Zueitina area at a camp of illegal migrants.

“They were arrested for deportation back to their countries.”

Libya is the main departure point for migrants trying to reach Europe by sea, with nearly 120,000 crossing the central Mediterranean in 2017.

Almost all leave from western Libya, though departures dropped sharply in July 2017 when some armed factions began blocking crossings.
Most of the migrants are from West African countries, though some East Africans enter Libya through Sudan.

Al-Arifi said a total of 5,686 migrants had been deported from eastern Libya in 2017, up from 2,912 in 2016.

One of the Eritrean migrants, speaking at a detention center in Benghazi, said he had arrived in Libya in March 2017 from Sudan, after paying 4,000 dollars for the journey.

He was taken across the Sahara desert to the western Libyan smuggling hub of Sabratha, and waited there with other migrants for about four months before being told the sea route had been closed.

Armed groups began preventing boat departures in Sabratha in July, and a major smuggling group was pushed out of the city in September.
The Eritrean said he had then crossed back through the town of Bani Walid to Ajdabiya in the east, close to Zueitina.

Smugglers had demanded another 2,000 dollars for the trip to Europe, but he was unable to pay and fled mistreatment at their hands.

“I wanted to go to Italy to work but unfortunately it wasn’t possible.

“We suffer from severe poverty in our country and there’s a dictatorial system.

“Now because we were treated badly by smugglers we are suffering from illnesses and skin diseases.