In May 2019 Middle East Eye reported that the International Organization for Migration was warning of a growing crisis for Ethiopian migrants held in makeshift detention sites in southern Yemen while trying to reach Saudi Arabia.
IOM said more than 3,000 migrants, mostly Ethiopians, were being held in temporary sites in Aden and Abyan, and that people were dying of preventable illness, being shot, or facing other cruel treatment under open sun in stadiums, camps, and public yards.
Many of the travelers were Oromo who had crossed through Djibouti by boat after hunger and insecurity at home. Refugees told MEE they walked for days with little water, hoped for Saudi work, and found that Yemen’s war made the Red Sea corridor even more deadly.
As Red Sea migration archive, the file records how Ethiopian poverty and conflict spilled into Yemen’s detention system long before later Gulf deportation waves made the same route famous again.
Sources: Middle East Eye