{{Rwanda has featured in a report which claims that Israel sends asylum seekers from Eritrea and Sudan without status to the east African country. }}
The Haaretz report criticises Tel Aviv government that asylum seekers from Eritrea and Sudan who agree to leave Israel voluntarily are being sent to Rwanda and Uganda without the benefit of official documentation or any guarantees of basic rights.
Eritreans and Sudanese are among the largest migrant group, accounting for 80% of the 53,646 asylum seekers from Africa in Israel.
The Israel government has in effect increased cash incentives to Africans to leave under its “voluntary departure” scheme from $1,500 to $3,500.
Last June, Israel’s High Court of Justice had reached an arrangement with an unnamed third country that would agree to accept asylum seekers from Africa.
At the time Uganda government denied the existence of such an agreement while Israel refused to discuss the arrangement.
However, in news report by UK’s Guardian newspaper, Uganda is reported to have agreed to the deal in exchange for agricultural technology and arms.
Meanwhile, there is no evidence to show that the claimed asylum seekers are on Rwanda soil except those from DRCongo that fled recent fighting in Eastern province of the vast central African nation.
Meanwhile,there is growing disquiet among asylum seekers themselves in Israel.
Early this year, hundreds of asylum seekers began a protest march from the Holot detention centre in the desert to Tel Aviv, calling for the release of all the detainees and asking that their asylum applications be processed.
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