Hundreds of refugees and asylum seekers are facing persecution in the Sudanese capital of Khartoum after being forcibly deported from Jordan.
Activists and deportees said that Sudanese authorities detained more than 100 people on their return to the capital last month, and some individuals are still missing.
“I’m now exposed to torture and persecution by the government, because I travelled [away] from Sudan,” Saleem, a 27-year-old who fled nearly four years ago, said. “Now I’m back in Sudan, it’s not possible to leave.” In a mass deportation unprecedented in Jordan’s history, Sudanese men, women and children were flown from Amman’s Queen Alia airport to Khartoum on the morning of 18 December.
Many had been taking part in a month-long tent protest at Amman’s UN human rights offices, demanding support and resettlement, but were rounded up and forced by Jordanian authorities to board the planes to Sudan.
When the refugees landed on Sudanese soil, the authorities are said to have taken fingerprints, phone numbers and confiscated some passports, and although some passengers were allowed to leave the airport to travel to the capital or villages elsewhere, many others were detained.
“I don’t know why the Sudanese government are doing it,” said Ali, who is now stuck in Khartoum. “In the airport they took my phone number, everyone’s… I had my friend with me. Someone came to him and said ‘I want to talk with you’. After that I never seen him [again].”
Ali said many other men were arrested, and he’s anxious about the brutal treatment that they may face. “Torture, I think,” he said. “You don’t know [with] the Sudan government.”
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