Fear of human disaster in Red Sea [Archives:2006/918/Letters to the Editor]
Sadat Mohamed Yusuf
dgeesh@hotmail.com
As we know there is always some very hazardous trip which the only horn African refugees pay its prize while crossing the 300km gulf of Aden, the latest one approximately 400 desperate refugee had lost their lives, during the latest two months of the last year. its running from Death and to death was the day to day activities which always happens in that death Sea.
Moreover we had heard the calls of international human rights organizations expressing their deep concern about that tragedy and as usual this does not change the ways and reasons, which causes the death of the desperate refugees. before its beginning in 1992, the first was Goobweyn Ship which was the first to sail from Somali to Yemen during the onset of the civil war in Somalia.
The sole explanations were the poor infrastructures of both the source and target countries which could not make possible to contain that everlasting human tragedy on one hand. And the unwillingness of the international community to effectively address the root cause of the problem fo at least to diminish.
We believe as a Somali refugee intellectuals in Yemen that if the international community does not take a preventive and responsive steps towards these desperate horn African refugees there would be a real human disaster which will happen during the upcoming months. This has few explanations:
First a prolonged drought that hit the southern west of Somalia had a wide impacts of the great new influx to Yemen for the upcoming months particularly from The region of Geode in Southern Somalia was the hardest-hit by the regional drought that had affected the neighbouring Ethiopia and its epicentre in northern Kenya.
People living mainly from rearing cattle sold to their Kenyan neighbours to buy grain, their animals had started dying by the hundred and thousands. Inter-ethnic clan fighting had worsened as rival clans battled for the few remaining water points in the barren region, as aid workers said the crisis was as much a water crisis as it was for food. as said by aid worker
Second: the Somalis has fed up and carry a very law hope to the current federal government to work out their differences and restore law and order properly. However I was told by one of the new arrivals that he fled from Somali particularly the south-west region of Geode after as he said had saw all his cows killed by famine so I have determined instead of dying like the animals its better to die on the Sea” He added, so owing to the above mentioned reasons the expected flow out for the refugees from death, Prolonged drought, and violence will also greatly affect an already scant humanitarian response in the death sea.
Therefore we Somali refugees intellectuals are appealing to the Yemeni government and international human rights organizations, United Nations to take preventive steps and actions to the expecting human disaster in Red Sea as the end of the calm seasonal seas is beginning to end which the already known unscrupulous human traffickers which are also the main sources of that repeating tragedy are exploiting these desperate Refugees mentionable cases of the inhuman practices are ordering desperate refugees to jump into the sea before approaching the coast, and the technical developments of the vessels which is the second case of the drowning results in red sea.
We hope this would be prevented as we have latest information that huge number of refugees are waiting to be smuggled to Yemen.
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