Around 100 Somali Migrants are Reported to have Drowned Off Yemeni Coast

About 100 Somali migrants have been reported drowned off the coast of Yemen when forced overboard by Somali smugglers in the Gulf of Aden, the United Nations Refugee Agency said on Saturday.

Some 47 survivors told the representative of the High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) that the boat carried about 150 Somali passengers and sailed on Monday.

Passengers were forced overboard at about 5km from the Yemeni shore. They sailed from the Somali port of Marera, near Bossaso in the north of the country, to cross the Gulf of Aden, UNHCR report said.

“12 were placed in a smaller boat, while the others were forced overboard and had to try to swim to shore,” UNHCR spokesman Ron Redmond told reporters in Geneva.

“Survivors said they counted a total of 47 people reaching shore, and later saw Yemeni authorities burying five bodies.”

The UNHCR estimates that some 32,000 migrants have arrived in Yemen from Somali and other countries in the Horn of Africa. The Gulf of Aden crossing killed at least 230 people while at least 365 are still missing.

Somalia is plunged into anarchy since the overthrow of dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991, when warlords used their clan based militias to remove the dictator, thereafter fighting one as they could not agree on leadership. This has displaced many in their own country.

Source African Press Agency

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