Egypt: Egypt prepares to forcibly return Eritreans

Human Rights Watch has urged the new government in Egypt against deporting Eritrean asylum seekers who are currently being detained in the North African country. The international advocacy group said Egyptian authorities are preparing to forcibly return a group of 118 Eritreans including recent deserters from the Eritrean Army; accusing Cairo of renewing the trend of mass deportations it exercised in 2008 and 2009. In most cases Eritrean refugees and asylum-seekers upon return are immediately thrown to secret detention centers where they are subjected to severe torture and other in-human treatments, the human rights group says.