Egypt's cold sweep on refugees

“Random arrests have swept up elderly people, patients and children,” said Marwa Hegazy, a Sudanese volunteer working with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Egypt to document and assist detained refugees, describing the latest security campaigns launched by the Interior Ministry in neighborhoods with large non-Egyptian populations.

The first weeks of 2026 have seen intensified security operations that have imposed a new rhythm on refugees’ lives in Egypt. What were once intermittent campaigns have become a near-daily reality, pursuing Syrians, Sudanese and other nationalities in apparent violation of international protection commitments that prohibit the forcible return of refugees.

Drawing on her daily life and visits to police stations across Alexandria, where refugees are being held, Hegazy told Al Manassa that campaigns targeting Sudanese and Syrian refugees—including holders of UNHCR cards—have escalated sharply in recent weeks. “These procedures happened every year, but they were lighter,” she said. “Now there are cases of completely random arrests.”

The security campaign has unfolded alongside a coordinated digital push calling for the “deportation of all refugees”

“There have been mass arrests across more than ten police stations in Alexandria, and the situation is extremely bad,” Hegazy described. “Most of those detained have UNHCR cards and are waiting for renewal appointments. I go around the stations every day to follow up on detainees and submit reports to UNHCR lawyers, but unfortunately the embassy and the UN agency have no real role.”

According to Hegazy, most detained Sudanese refugees are being held at the Agami police station, while Syrians are distributed between Montazah I and II, as well as Al-Attarin stations. She noted that she has not documented direct abuse by police officers. “The stations treat detainees respectfully,” she said. “But the procedures are harsh, and the campaigns are happening every day.”

The parallel between the security escalation and the coordinated online incitement—documented by the fact-checking platform Saheeh Masr—reinforces a manufactured image of an angry public. That image, activists say, is then used to normalize exceptional measures against refugees.

Children and elderly in detention

According to Hegazy, the role of the UNHCR, which is responsible for monitoring refugees’ cases and ensuring their protection, is largely limited to sending a lawyer to accompany detainees before prosecutors. She described a cycle of administrative release procedures that often drags on for days.

“The lawyer goes with the detainee to the prosecution,” she said. “They’re released with a recommendation to report to the relevant authorities—immigration and passports and National Security. Then they’re sent back to the station. The next day, they go again to immigration, passports and National Security, then to the embassy, then Abbassiya in Cairo, and then back to the station. Some people have been stuck in this same loop for eight or 10 days.”

Detention, the volunteer added, does not stop with adults. It has extended to children as well. “A few days ago, I was informed that children under 16 were taken in, even though they had valid residency permits,” she said. “This is the first time I’ve seen a refugee present a valid residency and still be detained.”

Hegazy also assists elderly and ill detainees, coordinating the delivery of medication into detention facilities alongside fellow volunteer Nada Fadol, a recipient of the UN Refugee Agency’s Nansen Award.

“Nada’s relationships with security authorities, through her work in volunteering and refugee affairs, make our task easier,” Hegazy said. “We visit stations together on a voluntary basis and stay in contact with UNHCR and the Egyptian Foundation for Refugee Rights, which serves as the agency’s legal partner.”

Rights groups condemn arrests

According to the UNHCR, Egypt hosts more than 914,000 registered refugees and asylum seekers from 61 nationalities. Since October 2023, Sudanese nationals have made up the largest group, followed by Syrians, with smaller numbers from South Sudan, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Yemen, Somalia and Iraq.

In December 2024, Egypt enacted a new asylum law establishing a permanent committee under the prime minister to oversee refugee affairs, including data management and coordination with the UN refugee agency.

On Jan. 22, the Refugees Platform in Egypt and 10 other rights organizations responded to the random arrest campaigns by issuing a joint statement calling for an immediate halt to practices of stop-and-search, criminalization, detention and coercive deportation targeting Syrians and other refugees and migrants solely on the basis of residency status. The statement also demanded the release of all those detained over administrative violations that can be regularized.

The organizations urged authorities to fully refrain from issuing any forced deportation orders against Syrians, given the continued grave risks in their country of origin. They also called for clear and workable legal pathways to regularize status, including recognition of temporary documents, shorter waiting periods at passport and immigration offices, an end to the use of administrative complexity as a pressure tool, and a halt to unlawful procedures that push people into irregular status and then punish them financially and personally.

The statement’s recommendations also stressed the need to ensure that any detention related to migration or asylum is subject to effective judicial review, with a clearly defined time limit, and that non-custodial alternatives be applied in line with international standards. It further called for granting the UNHCR full access to all detained asylum seekers and refugees, Syrians and others alike, and guaranteeing their right to legal counsel and to effectively challenge deportation decisions before they are carried out.

Interior Ministry breaks silence

Despite the accumulation of reports documenting refugee arrests and the statements condemning security practices, the Interior Ministry remained silent for weeks before breaking that silence in a statement issued on the evening of Monday, Feb. 2.

The ministry denied arresting a Sudanese national in Giza, while confirming that a widely circulated social media video showing the arrest of an individual was authentic. It said the incident took place in Alexandria and that the arrest was made because the person had “entered the country illegally.”

The statement prompted a response from refugee rights activist Noor Khalil, who raised a series of questions in a post on his personal Facebook page about the widening pattern of stops and detentions. He questioned the procedures applied to those deemed to be “in violation of residency conditions,” the ministry’s responsibility for microbuses that force people off the street and into vehicles, and the fate of those detained in the same manner since January.

Khalil also called for clarification on the number of people arrested, the pathways followed by those granted administrative release, whether the campaigns have included children or holders of valid residency permits, and the fate of those transferred between police stations in Cairo, Giza and Alexandria whose families still have no information about their whereabouts.

“Routine checks”

Seeking to reassure the community, Ibrahim Ezzedine, secretary of the Sudanese community in the city of 10th of Ramadan, said security screenings take place every year, particularly given the large number of refugees who entered the country through irregular routes.

He also attributed this year’s stricter measures to what he described as early signs of recovery in Sudan and Syria over the past year. “There are now some areas that are safe enough for citizens to return to,” he told Al Manassa.

Ezzedine stressed that neither the embassy nor the community has the authority to compile lists of violators or exert pressure on the Egyptian state. “Deportation or regularization is a sovereign matter. As foreigners, we have no say in it,” he said.

At the same time, he urged authorities to take into account the circumstances that drove refugees to flee and enter Egypt irregularly, often at great personal risk.

“We know their presence is not legal, and we are grateful to the Egyptian state for honoring us—we do not live in shelters or camps,” he said. “But we ask that circumstances be considered. We are not used to this. We see Egypt as our second home. If it were not for necessity, those in violation would not have chosen to reach Egypt through dangerous, irregular routes that put their lives at risk.”

In the face of this escalation, it appears that security measures alone are incapable of managing Egypt’s asylum file. Instead, they deepen the precarity of those who fled danger in search of safety. Only clear policies and workable legal pathways that respect the principle of non-refoulement can bring an end to the daily cycle of police stations and prosecutors and offer refugees a minimum level of security.