The United Nations High Commissioner For Refugees Zimbabwe Resident Representative, Marcelline Hepie, confirmed to The Zimbabwean that his organisation was "working with both governments to try and sort out the very sensitive matter".
Under Article 14 of the UN Charter on Human Rights, it is illegal for any nation to refuse to allow asylum seekers to enter its territory.
Asked what would be done about this, Hepie said: "The UNHCR does not force governments to deal with asylum seekers. We try to encourage governments to allow them into their countries when they seek asylum officially.
A Senior Ministry of Labour and Social Services official said in an interview in Harare that the asylum seekers from Somalia and Ethiopia had not "formally asked for asylum in Zimbabwe but were simply passing through using through the Nyamapanda Border Post with Mozambique".
The South African Government announced that as of the beginning of August, this year, it would begin deporting Zimbabweans that had not succeeded in regularising their stay in their country.
The UNHCR said it was thus "expected" that Zimbabwe would receive "large numbers of returned migrants from then onwards".
Post published in: News