UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay has called on the Egyptian Government to issue an immediate order to its security forces to halt the killings of unarmed migrants attempting to enter Israel through the Sinai Desert.
“While migrants often lose their lives accidentally while traveling in over-crowded boats, or trying to cross remote land borders, I know of no other country where so many unarmed migrants and asylum-seekers appear to have been deliberately killed in this way by Government forces. … It is a deplorable state of affairs, and the sheer number of victims suggests that at least some Egyptian security officials have been operating a shoot-to-kill policy. It is unlikely that so many killings would occur otherwise. Sixty killings can hardly be an accident.”
OHCHR also called for an independent inquiry in the deaths of the approximately 60 migrants who have been killed by Egyptian security forces since mid-2007. Most of the migrants are from sub-Saharan Africa.
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MIGRANTS AT SEA 