Thousands of refugees and migrants risking their lives on dangerous land routes across the African continent face extreme forms of violence, human rights abuses and exploitation, according to a report released Friday by the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and the Mixed Migration Centre (MMC). The organizations say the deaths of refugees and migrants in the Sahara Desert are believed to be twice as high as those at sea.
The report is based largely on interviews with 32,000 refugees and migrants between 2020 and 2023. According to the report, the number of people attempting dangerous land crossings has increased since the first edition of the report was published in 2020, as have the protection threats they face. It sheds light on the harsh realities faced by refugees and migrants traversing the perilous Central Mediterranean route from East and Horn of Africa and West Africa to the North African coast of the Mediterranean and across the sea.
With more people estimated to cross the Sahara than the Mediterranean, the report assumes that twice as many refugees and migrants die in the desert than at sea - although the statistics in the report seem to contradict this.
“In total, 1,180 persons are known to have died while crossing the Sahara Desert for the period January 2020 to May 2024, but the number is believed to be much higher,” the report says. “During the same period, around 7,115 people were reported to have died or gone missing in the Mediterranean Sea.”
Vincent Cochetel, UNHCR special envoy for the Western and Central Mediterranean Situation, clarified the seeming discrepancy between the numbers of reported land and sea deaths, noting that, “We do not have an accurate number of statistics of people who die along the land route because there is nobody collecting the bodies.”
“We have better knowledge of shipwrecks because people are collecting the bodies when the shipwreck is close to the shore of the Mediterranean,” he told journalists in Geneva Thursday in advance of the publication of the report.
“It is not based on hard data but based on the testimony of people,” he said.
The report notes that “the eruption of new conflicts in the Sahel and Sudan, the devastating impact of climate change and new disasters and emergencies in the East and Horn of Africa are driving many more people now than in 2020 to cross Africa’s dangerous land routes in search of safety and better economic opportunities.”
Among the horrific litany of risks and abuses reported by refugees and migrants are torture, physical violence, arbitrary detention, death, kidnapping for ransom, sexual exploitation, enslavement, trafficking, organ removal, robbery, and collective expulsion.
In the survey of 32,000 refugees and migrants, 38 percent of respondents cited physical violence as the main risk they faced during their journey. The risk of death, cited by 14 percent of respondents in the previous report, has now risen to 20 percent, and the risk of sexual and gender-based violence has also increased from 12.5 percent to 15 percent.
“The risk of kidnapping seems to be a new one,” Cochetel observed. “It used to be mentioned by 2% of the respondents four years ago, now it is mentioned by 18 percent of the respondents. Almost one out of five claim that the journey involves that risk of kidnapping.”
The report notes that in parts of the continent, refugees and migrants are increasingly encountering “insurgent groups, militias, and other criminal actors” and “where human trafficking, kidnapping for ransom, forced labor and sexual exploitation are rife.”
Cochetel said he was surprised to see that the survey respondents indicated that they did not necessarily consider smugglers and traffickers to be the main perpetrators of violence.
“We thought that they were the main troublemakers on the route,” he said. “In fact, it turns out it is more criminal gangs, that can sometimes include traffickers. But the perception by migrants and refugees, these are criminal gangs operating and it is also law enforcement authorities, non-state actors, which are normally armed groups abusing the people on the way.”
Bram Frouws, director of the Mixed Migration Centre, said it was regrettable to have to produce another report that yet again presents the “unimaginable levels of violence refugees and migrants are facing on these routes. It is unacceptable. […] This remains a collective stain on our conscience.”
He said all perpetrators of violence and other crimes against these vulnerable, desperate people must be held accountable “but, at the moment, much of this is happening in a situation of near complete impunity.”
“We need to stop going after the very low-level pickup drivers in Niger, for example. We should really follow the money and catch the big guys, the ones that are responsible for all this violence,” he said.
UNHCR, IOM, partners and several governments have stepped up life-saving services and assistance to refugees and migrants on the dangerous routes. But they say the humanitarian response is not enough.
Despite commitments made by the international community to save lives and address vulnerabilities in accordance with international law, the three organizations warn that the current international response is insufficient.
The organizations are calling for more concrete action to protect and save the lives of those who embark on dangerous journeys. They say more must be done to address the root causes of displacement and the drivers of irregular movements.
They urge positive action on peace-building, respect for human rights, governance, inequality, climate change and social cohesion, as well as the creation of safe pathways for migrants and refugees, spanning countries of origin, asylum, transit and destination.
Some information for this report provided by VOA.
Further information
Full text: On This Journey, No One Cares if You Live or Die: Abuse, protection and justice along routes between East and West Africa and Africa’s Mediterranean Coast: A route-based perspective on key risks, IOM, MMC and UNHCR, published July 5, 2024
https://publications.iom.int/books/journey-no-one-cares-if-you-live-or-die