CAIRO, December 31, 2005 (IslamOnline.net) – The brutal onslaught by Egyptian police forces on Sudanese refugees in Cairo shed light on a human tragedy of a large scale and continued to draw criticisms Saturday, December 31.

"We are still receiving terrible reports from our brothers and sisters that survived the savage onslaught but still under inhumane interrogation up to this moment," a refugee leader told IslamOnline.net Saturday, December 31, asking not to be named.

While Egyptian judicial sources told Agence France-Presse (AFP) Saturday that the death toll among Sudanese refugees resulting from the brutal attempt by Egyptian police forces to end a three-month-old peaceful protest has risen to 25, unconfirmed reports put the number of dead at "scores".

Over five thousand policemen armed with sticks and shields broke up the small square where the Sudanese refugees had been camping at around 5:00 am (0300 GMT) Friday, December 30.

A judicial inquiry has been opened into the deadly violence.

The refugee leader, who claimed to be a personal target for Egyptian security forces after Sudan presented a list of names to Cairo – including his – to be arrested and sent back home, said over 400 hundred refugees fell wounded after the police crackdown.

"The Egyptian security claimed they would be moving us to a civil camp, prepared for our living. But the refugees who were forced into these buses were beaten, stripped of all their personal possessions and taken to a police camp in Toura El-Balad [a town 20 miles (30 kilometers) south of central Cairo].

"They had arrested hundreds of us and so far (Saturday morning) over 500 are still in detention, subjected to interrogations, with all kinds of abuse practiced on them," he added.

An Egyptian security source told IOL, on condition of anonymity, that "only a handful of them were still arrested".

While the figures the refugee leader gave on the dead, wounded and detained could not be verified, eyewitnesses told IOL Friday the scene of the crackdown in Mohandeseen indicated a "human massacre" had taken place.

"They were using clubs indiscriminately. One officer held a three-year-old girl that was hit on the head, thinking she was unconscious but she was dead," an ambulance driver told IOL.

Over 2,000 Sudanese refugees have been living in a makeshift camp in a small square in Mohandessin, near the Cairo offices of the UNHCR, since September, in severe living conditions.

There have been complaints from the residents of the neighborhood, citing fears of outbreaks of disease due to sanitation problems.

The fate of the refugees remains unknown. (Reuters).

While the Sudanese government joined its Egyptian counterpart on putting the blame squarely for the mayhem on the unarmed refugees, the United Nations and United States both expressed their "sadness."

"Their deaths are a terrible tragedy that cannot be justified," UN chief Kofi Annan said in a statement.

He expressed "his profound regret that this situation was not resolved peacefully and through dialogue, as the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees had strongly urged."

The protestors had been sleeping rough in deteriorating sanitary conditions in their makeshift crowded camp to demand that the UN refugee agency review cases of asylum-seekers whose applications it has rejected, and resume resettling refugees in third countries.

An AFP reporter had seen several people being dragged away from the mayhem as refugees -- including dozens of women and small children -- tried to resist their evacuation.

The refugees were forced into dozens of buses in Cairo's neighborhood of Mohandessin, ending the standoff.

Most protestors were taken to a sealed military training camp in Tora Balad, which is home to a large prison notorious for its political detentions, according to AFP.

The United States said Friday it was "saddened" by the death of Sudanese refugees in Cairo.

"We are saddened by the death of Sudanese in Cairo today and we extend our condolences to the families of the victims and our sympathies to those who are injured," US State Department spokesman Adam Ereli told reporters.

"Our embassy in Egypt has been in touch with the Egyptian authorities and other relevant agencies to gather information on the situation," he added.

There are about 30,000 registered Sudanese refugees in Egypt but some estimates put the migrant population at two million.

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