102 Ethiopian migrants back home from Yemen: UN

By Afra Aksoy

SANAA

The UN migration agency reported on Monday that Yemen had repatriated over 100 Ethiopian migrants who wanted to go back home.

Saba al-Muallami, Yemen director for the International Organization for Migration (IOM), told Anadolu Agency that the agency rented an airplane for 102 migrants to return from Yemen, which is separated from Ethiopia by the Red Sea.

“This is the first time that Ethiopian migrants returned to their country voluntarily by using Sanaa Airport,” in the capital, he added.

Al-Muallami said that the number of Ethiopians migrants who decided to leave Yemen might top 400 within days.

Thousands of migrants have been successfully repatriated from Yemen to their home countries through main Yemeni ports such as Aden and Hodeidah.

Impoverished Yemen has remained wracked by violence since 2014, when Houthi rebels overran much of the country, including Sanaa.

The conflict escalated in 2015 when Saudi Arabia and its Arab allies launched a devastating air campaign in Yemen aimed at rolling back Houthi gains.