'Scenes of absolute horror': Saudi border guards guilty of mass killings of migrants, says HRW

“I saw people killed in a way I have never imagined.” Last February, 14-year-old Hamdiya was trying to cross the Yemen-Saudi border with a group of 60 people when she heard the gunfire.

“I saw 30 people killed on the spot.”

After witnessing the scene, Hamdiya was in shock. “I don’t know what happened after that,” she said. “I could feel people sleeping around me. Then I realised they were actually dead bodies.”

Her testimony is part of Human Rights Watch's (HRW) latest report alleging mass killings of migrants at the Yemen-Saudi border by Saudi border guards. The investigation suggests that systematic abuses against Ethiopians may amount to crimes against humanity.

Hundreds of Ethiopian migrants and asylum seekers crossing the border were killed between March 2022 and June 2023.

Hamdiya can now tell her story from the Yemeni capital, Sana'a, where she arrived with the help of other migrants. Although she survived the attack, she says she is psychologically scarred.

“I can’t sleep now. During the night I am so scared. I prefer people to stay awake and talk to me.”

Other ten people interviewed by HRW estimated that from 11 attempted crossings with a total of 1,278 migrants, they had seen at least 655 deaths.

"There are definitely many more deaths because it's impossible to get an accurate figure. It's an inaccessible area and we are interviewing people who have just fled a scene of absolute horror, they're devastated," Nadia Hardman, a researcher in the refugee and migrant rights division at HRW, told Euronews.

One of the survivors explained that from his group of more than170 people, 90 were killed: “Some returned to that place to pick up the dead bodies.”

The report states that Saudi border guards have used “explosive weapons” to