Women at a migrant detention facility in Benghazi, Libya. Photo by Mick Krever for CNN.
As mentioned by CNN
A CNN journalist headed to Libya to investigate cases of refugee trafficking and the torture they endure for ransom. The full report reveals the scale of criminal schemes and how families are forced to pay for contact with loved ones.
In the living room of her three-story apartment in rural Germany, Abeba squints at her phone.
“This will be my final message,” her younger brother Daniel says in an audio message. “I understand that you may not have the means to help me directly, and I never expected you to. Please just make sure my message reaches someone who can help.”
They don’t know exactly where he is now. Somewhere in southern Libya. They say it’s the Kufra region. What they know: every time he calls or they receive a video, he is mercilessly tortured by people who remain off-camera. CNN uses aliases for Daniel and Abeba out of fear of retribution.
If families cannot raise $10,000, death could await him.
CNN spoke with dozens of people and families in similar situations. Daniel is one of an unknown number of migrants who are now systematically tortured nearly every day somewhere in the southeastern Libyan Sahara.
The Ransom Violence Scheme and Its Scale
Libya, located in North Africa, has long been a transit country for those who dream of reaching Europe via the Mediterranean Sea. In the northeastern Sahara, the country fights smuggling and human trafficking, where ransom-transfer schemes are set up between families abroad and exploitative groups that profit from others’ misfortune.
Participants in this business operate with clear segmentation: many payments flow through the informal Hawala money-transfer system, which often leaves traces that are almost undetectable. The report also notes that countries with large diasporic communities of clients risk falling into the hands of traffickers and coercive agents.
Some testimony indicates that the most experienced intermediaries operate not only in Libya but also in overseas caches, where the ransom money is redistributed. Some cases end in arrests or confirmation of illegal activity, but the traders’ structure is highly fragmented and extensive.
The trafficking of refugees is often accompanied by distress for many people who fall into these traps, especially Eritreans, who constitute one of the largest groups in Libya. They frequently face forced labor and schemes that keep them under criminals’ control for long periods.
Here’s what happened to Abeba’s brother.
A plane over sand ridges above the Sahara desert reveals how the traffickers operate with boundless impunity. The desert is vast, its space stretches for many kilometers, and the road is often marked only by tire tracks in the sand.
“We do everything we can with what we have,” says Colonel Mohammed Hassan Raila from a post on a desert hill near the border with Sudan. His forces are part of the Libyan National Army, living in a small air-conditioned room, surrounded by sands for hundreds of kilometers. They venture out where suspicious cars may appear, but the traffickers know this terrain better than they do.
In the first large settlement in Kufra province near Libya they detained a man from Sudan who was considered the “money man” – an assistant in moving funds between relatives of victims abroad and traffickers who profit from the system. “I take them, and then I deduct my commission,” he told the interrogator about the payments.
The situation remains complicated: many payments are transmitted through hawala – a system that makes tracing nearly impossible due to its people-centered nature and use of text messages and calls.
“I take them, and then I deduct my commission.”
“Are they torturing them?”
“Only God knows.”
At a command center in Benghazi, dozens of young women and girls await help, as well as what the UN and humanitarian organizations can do for them. Among them is 16-year-old Eritrean Abrijet – she does not speak fully because of the danger, and her story demonstrates the consequences of this chain of enslavement.
“I just want to die. I want to die, but I can’t… I want to die, but I can’t.”
Responsibility for stopping such schemes lies with various structures, including the DCIM – the Department for Combating Illegal Migration of Libya. While existing mechanisms regard the situation as under control, the international community must respond more actively and provide medical and legal support to those affected.
“The matter requires government participation. This is a matter of partnership. All countries must become partners in eliminating this phenomenon.”
Over time, the number of refugees seeking protection in Libya exceeds official figures, as many fall into shadow schemes and prolonged detention. War and instability in the region push migrants toward Europe again, while vessels pressing on the borders continue to operate outside the law.
“May God punish them for what they did”
This story underscores that violence for ransom remains one of the sharpest facets of the migration crisis in the region. It requires coordinated efforts from the international community and active support from partner states in the fight against these criminal schemes.
