Leaders of the Supreme Council of Kenya Muslims (SUPKEM) on Wednesday urged the government to intervene in what they termed as illegal deportation of over 100 Kenyan Muslims to Ethiopia and Somali on suspicion that they were Union of Islamic Courts fighters.
Addressing the press in Nairobi, SUPKEM religious affairs director Mohammed Sheebwana said Muslim human rights organization in the country have expressed fears that some of the persons allegedly arrested by Kenyan authorities and transferred to Ethiopia and Somalia last year may disappear forever.
Sheebwana’s comments came barely a day after a new report released by the Muslim Human Rights Forum on Tuesday said it tracked the arrest and detention of 152 individuals in Kenya throughout last year and the deportation of at least 117 of them to the two Horn of Africa nations.
According to the report, there has been no official disclosure on the actual number and identities of the captives still held or of those released, neither by the Ethiopian authorities nor by their partners, namely the Kenyan, Somali and American authorities.
Sheebwana said the government has remained mum over the matter and urged it to address the distress of Muslim families who claim that some of the deported individuals are their relatives and were deported illegally. He said the Muslim community in the country is tired of always taking to the streets in protests over the deportation of Muslims.
