Yemen to deport 3,000 illegal residents [Archives:2004/782/Front Page]

Mohammed bin Sallam
The Yemeni Interior Ministry ordered last week its security agents to deport more than 3000 Non-Yemeni residents, the majority of whom are Arab nationals, for their illegal stay in Yemen.
Various media reported an official source at the Immigration & Passports Authority as saying: “the inspection campaign conducted by the security officers in ten Yemeni cities resulted in the detention of 3,000 illegal residents, most of whom hold Arab nationalities. Necessary arrangements have been made to send these residents back to their countries. There are also several thousand individuals who infiltrate into the country from the Horn of Africa, (especially Ethiopia and Somalia whose citizens escape war and the deterioration of livelihood) to find shelter in Yemen. The same official said that the influx of refugees from the Horn of Africa into Yemen terribly increased in the last period to reach the rate of one thousand every day. Meanwhile, the Yemeni Coast Guard Authority reported that armed confrontations took place on Thursday October 14th between Yemeni military boats and gunmen on two other unidentified boats who were ferrying refugees from Ethiopia and Somalia to the province of Shabwa on the coastline of the Arab Sea. According to the source, the confrontations resulted in the arrest of a boat and its crew while the other boat fled the scene during the clashes.
Official sources in Sana'a estimated the number of refugees in the Yemeni lands to be half a million, all of whom are from the Horn of Africa.
The problems encountered by the Yemeni Authorities doubled over the existence of refugees who do not abide by the law and regulations. Their presence in Yemen has caused increases of several crimes, including drug smuggling, producing wine, forming gangs for robbing and forging.
Additionally immoral acts spread horribly resulting in the rapid increase of AIDS sufferers all over the country. Official figures mentioned early that in the year 2003, 170 crimes were committed by Somali refugees and 24 others were committed by Ethiopian ones.
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