The Afars: Eritrea’s Forgotten Refugees
From Dan Connell, Visiting Researcher, BU African Studies Center
Thousands of refugees have made their way to eastern Ethiopia across Eritrea’s porous southern borders in recent years.
Many traveled by foot through the Danakil Depression, one of the lowest and hottest places on earth. Others slipped across the heavily militarized frontier with Djibouti. Still others escaped in small, single-sail dhows to Yemen. But they fly below the radar of most western media, aid agencies, and analysts, largely because they remain in the region rather than joining the flood of other Eritreans trying to reach Europe.