There’s hope for the thousands of Somali immigrants in Libya, now that Gadaffi is out of the picture. The United Nations refuge agency is helping Libya find a safe haven for them.

The United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) said on Sunday they were helping Libya’s new National Transitional Council (NTC) process 57 illegal immigrants from Somalia.

The UNHCR was responding to a call by the NTC to assist them in dealing with scores of illegal immigrants they say were put into a Tajoura camp by the Gaddafi regime.

During the conflict, deposed Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi threatened he would flood the European Union (EU) with illegal immigrants if the international community took punitive action against him.

The NTC moved the 300 African nationals from Tajoura to the oil institute, west of Tripoli, where they looked for suspected mercenaries among them.

More than 50 of the men, women and children in this building were initially caught five days ago trying to board fast inflatable boats to Italy.

[Ahmed Adell Ali, Somalian Refugee]:
“Most of us, we don’t have any qualifications, because we have been in fighting (back home) that’s why we run from Somalia. Even you can see, most of us we don’t have any education, we don’t have anything. We are not qualified people. All of us are youth from Somalia and we want to use our hands.”

The NTC said informants working among the Gaddafi forces, involved in the illegal immigration racket, pointed them to 14 fast inflatable boats preparing to sail to EU countries with the immigrants.

[Samuel Cheung, UNHCR Senior Protection Officer]:
“I think this is a larger problem that the NTC has indicated their desire to find a solution to. This, as I said, is a first step. We hope this is a very encouraging step. They are recognizing the humanitarian needs of a vulnerable group within this; (upon which) they can cooperate with the U.N. and the humanitarian community with.”

NTC said they would probably organize permanent homes for the immigrants inside Libya.

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