The 27-year-old is among some 70,000 illegal Ethiopian migrants expelled from the Gulf kingdom since March, as it seeks to reduce its reliance on millions of migrant labourers. "I'm not happy," she anxiously told the Thomson Reuters Foundation, while staying in a shelter for trafficked women run by a local charity Agar Ethiopia. During a 2013 crackdown, many of 160,000 Ethiopians who were expelled were first detained, beaten and held in squalid conditions, Human Rights Watch said. Experts say Ethiopians are likely to keep risking their lives as migrants because they lack opportunities at home. It is easy for smugglers to become traffickers, subjecting the migrants they are transporting to forced labour or sexual exploitation.

Source: Ethiopian News October 09, 2017 13:30 UTC