Representative image. Algeria has deported nearly 20,000 migrants from sub-Saharan Africa back to neighbouring Niger. Photo credit: AFP
Algeria has deported nearly 20,000 migrants from sub-Saharan Africa to neighbouring Niger since January, often under “brutal conditions”, Niamey-based NGO Alarm Phone Sahara told the media on Monday (September 1, 2024).
Since 2014, irregular migrants, including women and children, have been repeatedly pushed back by Algeria, a major transit point for those attempting to cross the Mediterranean Sea to Europe.
Moctar Dan Yaye, communications officer for Alarm Phone Sahara – which rescues migrants in the vast desert that stretches between Algeria and Niger – said 19,798 people were turned back between January and August.
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Migrants are often expelled “under brutal conditions” and “in the worst cases, with fatal consequences,” the NGO said in a report published in late August.
“Migrants are arrested during raids in their cities of residence or work, or at the Tunisian border, and are gathered in Tamanrasset (southern Algeria), and then loaded onto trucks and transported to Niger,” Mr. Yaye said.
The Nigerians are then driven to Assamaka, the first Nigerian village on the other side of the border, where they are looked after by local authorities.
However, other civilians are left at “Point Zero”, a desert area located on the Algerian-Nigerian border.
From there, Mr. Yaye said, they are forced to walk 15 kilometres (nine miles) to Asmaka in extreme temperatures.
After being registered by Nigerian police in Assamaka, the migrants are housed in UN and Italian temporary accommodation centres, and then sent to other centres in northern Niger, Yaye said.
“We hear many stories from migrants about abuse, violence and confiscation of their belongings by the Algerian army,” he said.
Niger’s military, which took power last year, summoned the Algerian ambassador in Niamey in April to protest against the “violent nature” of the repatriation operations and deportations.
Algiers followed suit, summoning Niamey’s ambassador and dismissing the allegations as “baseless.”
The NGO said that since Niger repealed a 2015 law criminalizing migrant smuggling in November, “many people have been moving freely along migration routes without fear of reprisals” as they did before.