Saudi border guards are accused of the mass killing of migrants along the Yemeni border in a new report by Human Rights Watch.
The report says hundreds of people, many of them Ethiopians who cross war-torn Yemen to reach Saudi Arabia, have been shot dead.
Migrants have told the BBC they had limbs severed by gunfire and saw bodies left on the trails.
Saudi Arabia has previously rejected allegations of systematic killings.
The Human Rights Watch (HRW) report, titled They Fired On Us Like Rain, contains graphic testimony from migrants who say they were shot at and sometimes targeted with explosive weapons by Saudi police and soldiers on Yemen’s rugged northern border with Saudi Arabia.
Migrants contacted separately by the BBC have spoken of terrifying night-time crossings during which large groups of Ethiopians, including many women and children, came under fire as they attempted to cross the border in search of work in the oil-rich kingdom.
He said some in his group of 45 migrants were killed when they came under fire as they tried to sneak across the border in July last year.
It was a brutal, chaotic end to a three-month journey fraught with danger, starvation and violence at the hands of Yemeni and Ethiopian smugglers.
A video filmed hours later shows his left foot almost completely severed. Mustafa’s leg was amputated below the knee and now, back with his parents in Ethiopia, he walks with crutches and an ill-fitting prosthetic limb.
Another Ethiopian migrant, who we are calling Ibsaa to protect his identity, said he was shot at the border by men wearing Saudi military uniforms.
Related posts:
2018 International Human Rights Day: #Stand Up For Human Rights
Human Rights Day: Timeline of Human Rights abuses across the world
Human Rights watch condemns rape by Uganda’s troops
Human Rights watch alleges Israel attacked Gaza, Lebanon with White Phosphorus
Rights group accuses Egyptian police of “forcibly disappearing” rights lawyer
Human Rights abuses continue in prisons – Rights group
Human Rights Day: ‘Stand for someone’s rights today, everyday’ – Ban
Ortom suspends operations of Benue livestock guards amidst killings
