Egypt releases 164 Sudanese refugees
Jan 12, 2006 (CAIRO) — The police have released 164 Sudanese refugees who were detained last month when police evicted them from a city park in a violent operation that brought international condemnation.
The spokeswoman of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, Astrid van Genderen Stort, said the Sudanese were released on Wednesday on the refugee body’s recommendation because they were registered with it either as refugees or asylum seekers.
They had lost their registration documents in the chaos of the Dec. 30 raid on the park, she said.
An Egyptian security official confirmed the release of the 164 migrants.
The released were among more than 1,000 Sudanese refugees who camped in a Cairo park for three months to protest what they saw as a failure by the UNHCR to resettle them. After hours of negotiations and sprays of water cannon, police officers with truncheons evicted them from the park and detained them.
Security officials said 25 refugees died, including women and children. More than 70 police officers were wounded. The Interior Ministry said 12 people died, and blamed the violence on the squatters’ refusal to leave. International and local rights groups accused the police of unnecessary brutality.
Van Genderen Stort said she believed the 164 released were part of a group of more than 600 whom the government had planned to deport back to Sudan. But she could not be sure because the UNHCR never got the names of the migrants who were listed for deportation.
Egypt said earlier this month it was going to deport the group, but it twice deferred the move. It has now given the UNHCR until Sunday to assess the status of the migrants.
Van Genderen Stort said Thursday the UNHCR knew of 463 Sudanese who were still in detention. Those detained in the eviction who had permission to stay in Egypt were released within days.
Van Genderen Stort said the UNHCR had provided the released migrants with new registration cards. She said they included 41 women and 31 children.
“We are not promoting return to Sudan because we think the country is not safe completely,” she said.
She said the UNHCR had asked Egypt not to deport any refugees, but added “we have not received assurances that no one will be deported.”
The refugees do not want to return to Sudan.
(AP/ST)