adminNIAMEY. — Niger has rounded up close to 150 migrants crossing the Sahara to Algeria in the past two days, in a crackdown on illegal migration after 92 people died of thirst trying to make the same desert journey. The grisly discovery on Wednesday of the bodies of mostly women and children left stranded in the harsh Sahara desert after their trucks broke down, has prompted Niamey to clamp down on migrant trafficking networks.
A security source said on Saturday that around 100 migrants, mostly men and some children, had been stopped in the desert and placed in police cells in the northern town of Arlit, a transit point for people seeking passage to Algeria.
“The migrants are being held at the gendarmerie but we do not yet know what will become of them,” said the security source. According to an aid group in Arlit, the group was travelling on board two lorries and three pick-up trucks.
Niger’s government earlier announced it had “intercepted” 47 other migrants on Friday headed for Assamaka, the last town in Niger on the route to Tamanrasset, in southern Algeria. Tamanrasset was the intended destination for the 92 migrants whose bodies were found decomposed in the desert.
Gut-wrenching details have emerged about the deaths of the 52 children, 33 women and seven men in early October.
Stranded, thirsty and desperate, some of them set out for help. Nineteen reached Tamanrasset alive, while another man walked to Arlit and a woman was saved by a driver who came across her in the desert.
The bodies, some of them eaten by jackals, were found in different locations across a 20km radius. A resident of Tamanrasset who organised the deadly voyage has been imprisoned in Arlit. Niger’s Prime Minister Brigi Rafini made an appeal to his countrymen on Saturday not to attempt illegal migration but to stay at home. — AFP.
Online Reporter