Sudan to repatriate its nationals expelled from Jordan

December 17, 2015 (KHARTOUM) – The Sudanese government said preparing to repatriate some 800 Sudanese asylum seekers back to Sudan from Jordan where local authorities decided to expel them.

Reports from Amman, say the Jordanian police on Wednesday 16 October forcefully moved the Sudanese who were camping in front of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) office there to the airport to process them for deportation.

In a statement issued on Thursday, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said that “dozens of Jordanian police arrived with around 14 buses at about 4 a.m. on December 16, and ushered all the Sudanese from their protest camp tents into the buses”.

In Khartoum, the Sudanese foreign ministry spokesperson Ali al-Sadiq told reporters that the government is awaiting the green light of the Jordanian authorities to send air-planes to repatriate the Sudanese nationals.

Al-Sadiq further expressed his government rejection of indecent treatment of the Sudanese that Jordan decided to deport from its territory.

“Jordan has the right to not give them residence permit but it has no right to abuse them,” he said.

An international journalist who went to the airport told HRW she saw 30 to 40 children among the Sudanese set for deportation.

Jordanian government spokesperson Mohamed al-Momani told the CNN Arabic Service, that the deportation decision Wednesday was in coordination with the Sudanese authorities, adding the deportees do not fit the refugee definition.

“They entered (in Jordan) for treatment in the country but not as refugees. Also the UNHCR does not give them the refugees status. So they do not fit with the refugee definition,” al-Momani said.

The UNHCR estimates that there are some 4,000 Sudanese asylum seekers in Jordan.

Sudanese used to travel for treatment in Jordan as they get easily an entry visa to the country.

(ST)