E/CN.4/2001/21 page 6 occurred in September 2000 in Libya. The Libyan representative reacted by maintaining that the incident had involved the repatriation of 600 criminals by the Libyan Government. However, the Special Rapporteur still comes across newspaper reports to the effect that: “It was difficult for the Libyan authorities to maintain for very long their rather anodyne version of the dramatic events that had taken place at Ezzaouia at the end of September. Six people died (one of whom was a Libyan). This official figure was very quickly refuted by the survivors of the pogrom who managed to leave the Jamahiriya. In point of fact, several hundred immigrant African workers were killed. In order to maintain good relations - obviously motivated by self-interest - between their respective Governments and Libya, the African chancelleries at first remained silent, content to accept at face value the explanations presented by Ali Abdesalam Triki [the Libyan Government’s official responsible for African questions]. (…) However, the tidal wave of immigrants seeking refuge in embassy compounds and the complaints of non-governmental organizations eventually revealed the seriousness of the situation. Abuja then chartered a plane which, in the course of seven trips, evacuated 450 Nigerian nationals. Almost 5,000 others are waiting to leave the former Libyan eldorado. John Jerry Rawlings, the President of Ghana, went to Tripoli to recover his nationals. Sudanese and Chadians are also leaving the Jamahiriya in droves. The 2 million Africans residing legally in Libya are completely terrified (…) President Ghadaffi at last broke his silence during a visit to Damascus. Two ministers have been designated as scapegoats: Fawzia Chalabi, who is being relieved of his functions as Minister of Information (the Leader blames him for lack of communication during the Ezzaouia incident) and Mohammed Belkacem Yaoui, Minister of Justice and the Interior, who is also being fired …” (see Jeune Afrique of 17 to 23 October 2000). 6. The Ivorian daily Fraternité-Matin of 22 November 2000, refers to “serious incidents in Libya (killings, pillaging, expulsions),” and reports that: “Immigrants said that they were victims of racist attacks resulting in deaths, expulsions and repatriation for the luckiest. (…) immigrants from sub-Saharan Africa, and especially nationals of Burkina-Faso, Cameroon, Ghana, Niger, Nigeria, Sudan, Chad and even Côte d’Ivoire, were treated by locals and particularly by young “rebels” in a way reminiscent of apartheid. The authorities, who attribute this violence to clashes between gangs from black Africa, expelled several thousand back to their countries of origin.” The same issue of Fraternité-Matin, under the heading “Mémoire”, contains the following: “The endangered dream of the colonel who, rightly or wrongly, is regarded by the West - and even by some Africans - as the great defender of the African continent, the dream of the Libyan colonel to see a frontier-free continent (ever since the proposal for an African Union was adopted at the thirty-sixth summit of the Organization of African Unity at Lomé, Togo, in July 2000, at the instigation of Colonel Ghadaffi) has melted away like snow in the sun as a result of violent brawls between young Libyans and African Blacks living in Libya. This drama, which resulted in several deaths, including two Ivorians, among the Black African population, was triggered by nothing more than a