Migrant boat deaths off the coast of Djibouti: Three survivors speak

Obock, Djibouti — Abdourazak, Tajir, and Mohamed are Ethiopian migrants who survived a vicious attack by people smugglers last Thursday (15/10) while crossing the Gulf of Aden from Yemen to Djibouti which left 12 people dead and an unknown number of others missing, the second such incident in recent weeks.

Most of the passengers on board the boat were trying to reach the small Horn of Africa nation has failed to get to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia where they had hoped to find jobs or to escape the violence and chaos in Yemen.

All paid smugglers to get on the boat, having used their life savings or borrowed money from family members back home to get to Yemen.

“It was around 8 pm when our boat left Yemen,” 20-year-old Abdourazak recalled.

“We had been sailing for about five hours. The boat seemed to hit something in the water. The captain decided to stop the engine to check. But then the smugglers demanded we all get off the boat.”

“As the shore was still far away, we said ‘no’. Then two smugglers started hitting us with sticks and we were forced off the boat into the water. As we were trying to swim towards the coastal line, the water became deeper. Some of the people who were able to swim helped those who couldn’t. Everyone was panicking. Then a big wave hit us.”

Abdourazak was separated from his brother in the water.

“I heard him call for me and cry for help but I could not reach him,” he said.

Tajir and Mohamed were in the water too.

“The big wave dispersed all of us. Everyone was yelling for help,” they said.

Tajir says he narrowly managed to save his own life.

“I was barely able to get to shore myself, and I was unable to help any of my friends,” he said.

Upon reaching the safety of dry land the three young men discovered they had lost family members and friends in the attack.

“I tried to find my brother but couldn’t. The body of one of the people on board with us washed up on shore in the morning and we buried him. And so I gave up hope of finding him,” Abdourazak said.

Said Mohamed; “Once we got to shore, I saw that the body of one of my friends had washed up on the beach. Out of my seven friends, only three of us survived.”

The three young men decided to walk towards the town of Obock, exhausted, hungry and dehydrated.

“We sought refuge under a tree until a team from IOM, the International Organization for Migration came to help us,” one of the men said.

Abdourazak, Tajir and Mohamed are currently receiving help at IOM’s Migrant Response Centre in Obock, Djibouti.

This is the second similar incident this month. On 5 October, eight Ethiopian migrants were killed by smugglers and several left injured in the same way on the same route.

IOM Djibouti has been providing emergency medical care, food, water and counselling to survivors and is currently assisting an estimated 449 migrants.

Meanwhile, around 14,500 migrants are stranded in Yemen with little-to-no access to shelter, water, food or health care while being labelled as carriers of disease and targeted by xenophobic attacks.

The Djiboutian authorities and IOM fear that despite such tragedies many migrants are still trying to travel to Djibouti from Yemen, who could be exploited and attacked by smugglers, raising the prospect of more harrowing survivor stories.