Tuesday, July 25, 2017

Ethiopia urges illegal workers in Saudi Arabia to come home

(Jul, 25, (BBC))--Ethiopia says that only a fraction of its citizens working illegally in Saudi Arabia have returned home before today's amnesty deadline. In March, the Gulf state said that those without papers would not be arrested if they left within 90 days.

The deadline was extended by another month, but so far only 60,000 out of an estimated 400,000 Ethiopians have left, the Ethiopian government says. Ethiopians make up a large portion of the kingdom's undocumented workers. All those without papers now face imprisonment or forced deportation.

Africa Live: Updates on this and other stories Ethiopia's Communications Minister Negeri Lencho told the BBC he feared what could now happen to his compatriots who were still in Saudi Arabia, adding they must return "with a sense of urgency".

"They will be imprisoned and we don't want our citizens to face unnecessary imprisonment, or suffer any physical harm or humiliation," Mr Lencho said. Read more from BBC »

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