CAIRO: Egypt will allow United Nations officials access to Eritrean asylum seekers on its territory, the Egyptian foreign ministry said Sunday.
The move comes after rights group Amnesty International last week charged that the Egyptian authorities had deported around 200 asylum seekers to Eritrea where they risk torture, and were preparing to expel another 1,400 currently held in detention.
The Egyptian authorities will facilitate meetings between officials of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and Eritrean asylum seekers, ministry spokesman Hossam Zaki said in a statement.
Abeer Etefa, UNHCR spokeswoman for the Middle East and North Africa, hailed the move.
UNHCR welcomes the decision of the Egyptian authorities to grant our staff access to Eritrean asylum seekers in detention centers in different parts of Egypt, Etafa said late Sunday.
Two staff are on the way tonight to Aswan and Hurghada to meet with the asylum seekers, she added.
UNHCR will continue seeking information from the government on the deportations, which according to several reports have taken place, and to prevent such measures in the future, she told AFP.
UNHCR has 1,503 Eritreans registered with the office in Egypt as refugees and asylum seekers and there are reports of up to 1,600 Eritreans who entered Egypt in the last few months in detention centers.
An Egyptian security official on Friday confirmed to AFP that 200 Eritreans had been deported and that authorities are preparing to deport a large number of Eritreans back to their country.
Amnesty said most asylum-seekers returned to Eritrea are likely to be arbitrarily detained incommunicado in inhumane conditions from weeks to years.
They will be at serious risk of torture or other ill-treatment, particularly those who have fled from compulsory military service.
Hundreds of Eritrean asylum-seekers have reached Egypt via its southern border with Sudan, either hoping to receive permanent refugee status from the United Nations agency for refugees UNHCR, or to make it to neighboring Israel.
In recent months Egypt has arrested scores of illegal immigrants, mostly Africans, trying to sneak into Israel from the Sinai in search of work. Several have been killed while trying to cross the frontier. -AFP
