Human Rights Watch today accused Saudi border guards of firing “explosive weapons” at Ethiopian migrants trying to cross from Yemen to the wealthy Gulf kingdom, killing hundreds since last year. “Saudi border guards have killed at least hundreds of Ethiopian migrants and asylum seekers who tried to cross the Yemen-Saudi border between March 2022 and June 2023,” wrote Nadia Hardman, researcher in the Refugee and Migrant Rights Division at HRW, in a report issued in English. In 2015, Saudi Arabia formed a military coalition to oust the Houthis, who had seized control of the Yemeni capital, Sanaa, from the internationally recognised government the previous year. Some survivors described attacks at close range, with accounts of Saudi border guards asking Ethiopians “which limb of their body they would prefer to have shot, and then shooting that limb” the report said. A 20-year-old woman from Ethiopia’s Oromia region reported that Saudi border guards shot at a group of migrants they had just released from custody.

Source: Ethiopian News August 21, 2023 11:25 UTC