Ogaden refugees in Kenya ask for govt protection

Ogaden liberation fighters in Ethiopia.Photo/File

BY ALBERT NYAKUNDI

Ogaden refugees living in Kenya have called on the government to protect them.

The refugees have decried rising kidnapping and harassment of their officials in Kenya. Speaking in Eastleigh, Nairobi  the Ogaden Refugees Committee chairman Ahmed Farah Mohamud said Kenya and the international community have a duty to protect refugees.

"We are appealing to the Kenyan government and the international community to ensure safety and wellbeing of two officials of Ogaden National Liberation Front who were kidnapped in Nairobi on January 26."

He said the two officials were part of ONLF team that was negotiating on behalf of the Ogaden community.

ONLF is a separatist movement that seeks recognition of Ogaden as a sovereign state by the Ethiopian government. Farah said despite the Ogaden refugees escaping from Ethiopia because of torture and human rights abuses,they are still facing  abuses like killings,kidnapping,illegal extraditions,intimidations while in host countries particularly in the  the Horn of Africa.

The  ONLF chairman lauded the Kenyan government for arresting three people including two policemen in connection to the recent kidnapping of ONLF officials Sulub Abdi Ahmed and Ali Ahmed Hussein.

"It's a move giving Ogaden refugees hope of living peacefully in Kenya and shows Kenya's commitment to protecting the rights of refugees and asylum seekers." Farah said.

Farah said that according to a website of Jigjiga,a Somali regional state in Ethiopia the two ONLF officials were captured by Ethiopian Militia group known as Liyu Police. Sulub Abdi Ahmed's wife Kadra Ibrahim Qaman has called on the international community to help find her husband.

=>thestar