CAIRO —Mona Abdel-Rahman, 52, fled Sudan's civil war with her six children and her mother. “Our tribe was targeted. They killed the young men and raped the girls, so we fled," she said. After six months living in displacement, she arrived in Egypt. But she has not found the refuge she was hoping for there.
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Her oldest son, Moustafa, was arrested in Giza and forcibly returned to Sudan — despite her desperate efforts to prevent his deportation.
He and Abdel-Rahman were waiting outside of a hospital for a vehicle to take them home after an appointment, when a police detective stopped Moustafa for not having a visa or travel documents. Abdel-Rahman tried to explain that they were seeking asylum and had an appointment in less than a week with the United Nations refugee agency in Cairo.
“But the police officer didn’t care,” Abdel-Rahman said.
Security threat
Mustafa was taken to the Giza police station and was referred to prosecutors, who ordered his release the following day. He was taken back to the police station, where he was kept until his deportation. Abdel-Rahman was only able to visit him once with permission from prosecutors.
Six days after Moustafa's arrest, the family was registered at the UNHCR. Still behind bars, Moustafa did not attend the appointment and did not obtain an asylum seeker card. Abdel-Rahman asked the UNHCR and St. Andrews, which provides legal support to refugees, to intervene, but to no avail.
For three months, Abdel-Rahman made regular trips to the police department, the prosecutors, the supporting institutions, and even the Sudanese embassy, which issued an emergency document to deport him.
Mustafa wasn’t an isolated case.
Egypt's deportation of African refugees, especially those from Sudan, has increased in recent months, according to Nour Khalil, researcher and director of the Refugees Platform in Egypt, and Ahmed Moawad, a lawyer specializing in refugee and immigration cases.
An orchestrated campaign
A joint investigation by the Refugees Platform in Egypt and the New Humanitarian platform published in May, found that thousands of detainees and deportees were mistreated, and their legal and human rights were violated.
This campaign began in August, when the Prime Minister's office issued a two-part decision stating that all fees and fines related to foreigners’ residency in Egypt be paid in U.S. dollars, and that foreigners residing in Egypt “illegally” must legalize their status by paying a fee of $1,000 within three months. In March, that decision was extended for another six months.
"The police have started targeting people with dark skin."
“As a result of this decision, the police have started targeting people with dark skin,” Moawad said. The lawyer notes that the number of people seeking advice from his office has increased, and say their relatives have been arrested residency issues. While most cases of arrest and forced deportation concern Sudanese and Eritrean people, Moawad met a Jordanian-Palestinian man who was given a deportation stamp when he went to regularize his status with the Immigration and Passports Department.
“The campaign is nationwide,” Moawad said, citing the example of a Sudanese woman registered as a refugee with the UNHCR. She was arrested by the Immigration and Passports Department of the Ministry of Interior while helping others with residency procedures.
"The prosecutors ordered her release the next day. But she was not released and a decision was issued to deport her,” he said. Moawad sued the government to stop her deportation, but said “she was deported on the same day the trial session was to take place."
EU political cover
In March, rights groups called on Egyptian authorities to stop violations against the Sudanese refugees, after two groups said they received hundreds of reports of “systematic arrests of refugees and migrants, arbitrary detention and forced return campaigns.”
Hundreds of migrants have been deported, or accused of entering the country illegally or joining a criminal human trafficking group, said Khalil of the Refugees Platform in Egypt. He attributes this unprecedented campaign to money, but also a "security obsession against any marginalized groups", saying security forces do not understand the surge in refugees or how to deal with it.
The European Union provides political cover for these policies.
But Khalil also links the campaign government’s desire meet European interests, by preventing migrants from reaching Egypt’s northwestern regions, where they can then try to reach Europe through Libya. “The state cannot control the movement of refugees, but it can scare them, so they do not leave their homes,” he said.
In March, Egypt signed a partnership agreement with the European Union, which includes 7 billion euros in loans and investments. It includes funds to combat illegal migration and terrorism.
“The European Union provides political cover for these policies. The agreement is that Europe gives Egypt and Tunisia money to prevent people from crossing the sea,” Khalil said. “Is there any oversight over these funds?"
Worldcrunch 🗞 Extra!
Know more • Since the outbreak of the Sudanese civil war more than a year ago, Egypt has welcomed more than half a million individuals fleeing the conflict, according to Egyptian weekly Al-Ahram. Yet, mass arrests and forced returns are widely reported and were condemned by Amnesty International in a report published on June 19. According to the NGO, Sudanese refugees have been arrested and returned to Sudan without a fair process and without the opportunity to apply for asylum, in violation of international law. Sudanese refugees have also been detained in what have been defined by the same refugees as “inhumane” and “cruel” conditions by Egyptian authorities. The report also highlights the role of the EU in these human rights violations, pointing at the €200 million that the bloc is set to send to Egypt as part of a broader cooperation deal signed earlier this year. L'Orient-Le-Jour writes that the official number of Sudanese refugees in Egypt is likely higher as many have been forced to cross the border illegally following Egypt’s decision to reintroduce visas for all Sudanese citizens some months after the outbreak of the war. “Previously, women, children and men over 50 crossed [the border] without any formalities,” the Lebanese newspaper reports. — Fabrizio La Rocca (read more about the Worldcrunch method here)
New EU policy
According to Khalil and Moawad, the Egyptian government tightened its grip on the southern border when the war in Sudan began. Sudanese who want to enter Egypt must obtain security approval, which costs up to $3,000 for an agent to facilitate obtaining the document, both Khalil and Moawed said.
“Entering through smuggling for about $1,500 would be less expensive,” Khalil said, adding that the situation is much worse in southern Egypt. “Entire families are arrested in the south, children are held in prison for months, people are detained and deported without a case, and pregnant women are detained in poor conditions without care,” he said.
Amid the crackdown in Egypt, the European Parliament approved, on April 10, new migration and asylum laws that add further restrictions on migration. Khalil said these new "fascist measures” aim to limit migration for security reasons.
“The number of asylum seekers has increased, and the EU does not want them,” he said.
UNHCR slow down
Meanwhile, the UNHCR has made the situation dire by slowing the asylum application process.
"I know people who have been given appointments for interviews after a year,” Khalil said. The residency for those registered at the UNHCR is valid for six months, and it is renewed for another 8 months.
Legally, "refugees are the real responsibility of the Commission," says Dr. Ibrahim Awad, Professor of Public Policy and Director of the Center for Migration and Refugee Studies at the American University in Cairo. Awad said Egypt refuses to settle refugees due to their increased population. That leaves asylum seekers with a choice: be resettled in another country through the UNHCR; leave the country; or remain as illegal immigrants.
If the situation calms down in Sudan, we will return.
The crackdown has raised panic among refugees and migrants in the country. Meanwhile, Abdel-Rahman is concerned for her other children: "Even though they obtained UNHCR cards, our movement is still limited. I'm worried that what happened to Moustafa will be repeated.”
Abdel-Rahman said Moustafa was transferred to Aswan, in southern Egypt, then to the border crossing between Egypt and Sudan, where Egyptian authorities then handed him over to the Sudanese police. He managed to communicate with his family once he reached the Sudanese town of Wadi Halfa.
“We are staying here in Egypt, but our situation is very difficult. There is no money, no work. If the situation calms down in Sudan, we will return," she said.