Algeria Forces Sub-Saharan African Refugees Across Border into Niger

The border between Niger and Algeria is in the Sahara Desert, where hundreds of non-Nigerien migrants have been dropped off by Algerian security forces in an attempt to expel them. [Creative Commons]

Human Rights Watch (HRW) released evidence on October 9 that migrants have been taken from nine different cities in Algeria and expelled into Niger since early September. This includes more than 3,400 migrants of at least 20 nationalities.

The news comes a little over a week after the Algerian Interior Minister announced an aggressive new strategy for combating irregular immigration. Two days later, security forces expelled 705 adults and children into the Nigerien desert. Two days after that, 957 more people were subjected to the same process, along with another 660 three days later.

Of the migrants expelled since September, approximately 430 were children. These mass expulsions are reportedly a continuation of a policy that has been in place for months, expelling  a total of about 16,000 people just this year. Human Rights Watch researcher Lauren Seibert notes that Algeria has the right to “protect its borders, but not to arbitrarily detain and collectively expel migrants, including children and asylum seekers, without a trace of due process.” 

Seibert also underlines the necessity for authorities to “verify immigration or asylum status individually and ensure individual court reviews.” 

In its report, Human Rights Watch lists instances of abuse of power by Algerian authorities. Migrants and refugees’ expulsions typically entail an abrupt and traumatic removal from their homes, workplaces, and schools, and children have frequently been separated from their families during the mass arrests. Some unaccompanied children under the age of ten were deported. 

According to HRW, the migrants are arrested and forced into a convoy without being screened for refugee status or given the opportunity to speak with a lawyer. “Scores of asylum seekers registered with the United Nations refugee agency, UNHCR, are among those arrested, with several already expelled,” HRW’s reports. 

A UN report on migrant rights in Niger found that “in the absence of individual risk assessments and due process guarantees… forced returns amount to collective expulsions and are contrary to international law, including the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families.” 

Transcripts of UN General Assembly discussions from July 2019 reveal that, prior to the expulsions, Algerian authorities inform their Nigerien counterparts, who then transport the migrants to the nearby town of Assamakka. Theoretically, they are then returned to their communities of origin. However, of the 3,400 migrants expelled from Algeria since September 5, only 1,800 were from Niger.

The Nigerien authorities did not provide assistance to the other 1,600 migrants, who were left at the border in the desert. Some, however, manage to make the journey on their own: an operations officer for the International Organization for Migration reported that 391 migrants from 16 West and Central African countries successfully arrived in Assamaka on Friday. 

Bazoum Mohammed, the former Minister of the Interior of Niger, said that, “we have had long discussions with the Algerian authorities on multiple occasions, during which we asked them not to send youths from Mali, Guinea, and other countries. We are ready to accept all the Nigeriens.” 

Many migrants told Human Rights Watch associates that the Algerian military left them at a location informally known as “Point Zero.” They were told to walk 15 kilometers to Niger’s closest village, Assamakka, with no guidance. The temperatures of that region of the Sahara can reach 113 degrees Fahrenheit during the day.