Kriminelle bander holder afrikanere på vej til at søge arbejde i Saudi Arabien som gidsler mod store løsepenge og mishandler dem systematisk i “hemmelige huse” i landet på Den arabiske Halvø.
HAJJAH, 12 March 2012 (IRIN) – The discovery of 70 battered (forslåede) men and women held captive in a remote area of Yemen’s Hajjah Governorate near the Saudi Arabian border has sparked an investigation into the torture and extortion (bortførelse) of African immigrants by criminal gangs, say local authorities.
The men and women, Oromos and ethnic Somalis from Ethiopia’s Somali Region, had been held for some time in a house in the Sharqia area of Haradh city, and were found wearing just their underwear.
Two men who managed to escape by jumping over the wall of the house, alerted the authorities. Their captors, they said, had beaten them with pipes (metalrør), burned them with cigarettes and poured liniment (svidende salve) in their eyes, making them scream in pain.
“We are really shocked,” said Ali Ibrahim, a criminal investigator in Haradh. “I have been in the department for 15 years and I do not remember anything like this… It is unbelievable that this was going on in our own back yard.”
Another government official who preferred anonymity told IRIN: “This problem is unique. No one could imagine that the people were kept in a smuggler’s house for such a long period of time. We do not know how many were killed.”
Wanting money for freedom
Many of the victims, according to head of Haradh Security Department Mohammed Najad, were trying to find their way to Saudi Arabia to get work, but had ended up in the hands of criminals who demanded thousands of dollars in ransom (løsepenge) for their release.
The immigrants are tortured until their families send ransom money, or until enough new immigrants arrive, as there is simply not enough space to keep all the migrants, said Berhane Taklu-Nagga, head of the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) office in Haradh.
On 6 March, the local independent news website Al-Masdaronline.net (kun på arabisk, red.) published pictures of some of the victims.
According to a recent Interior Ministry report, 170 Africans were held captive, tortured and mistreated by criminals in Haradh between January 2011 and February 2012.
“The victims include 91 young men, 10 women, 50 children and 19 elderly men,” the report said, adding that most had been beaten, scalded (skoldet) or punched in the face, leaving some with visual and hearing problems.
In February, the ministry said, police in Haradh had arrested two suspects. One was holding 49 and the other 79 Ethiopian illegal immigrants.
The authorities are still searching for another 20 Ethiopian female immigrants whom they believe are at risk of being tortured and raped, said Hamoud Haidar, head of Haradh Local Authority.
Rape (voldtægt)
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http://www.irinnews.org/Report/95051/YEMEN-Tortured-for-ransom
