UN Report Documents ‘Shocking’ Abuses Against Migrants in Libya, Calls for End to Forced Returns

UN Report Documents ‘Shocking’ Abuses Against Migrants in Libya, Calls for End to Forced Returns
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A joint report by the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights and the UN Support Mission in Libya has documented widespread and systematic abuses against migrants, refugees, and asylum seekers in Libya, urging an end to forced returns and stronger accountability measures.

Covering the period from January 2024 to December 2025, the report is based on interviews with nearly 100 migrants and refugees from 16 countries across Africa, the Middle East, and South Asia. It details killings, torture, sexual violence, human trafficking, and arbitrary detention, describing the situation as having become “business as usual” within what it called a violent, profit-driven trafficking model.

According to the findings, criminal networks—often linked to actors inside and outside Libya—kidnap migrants and transfer them to formal and informal detention facilities without legal process. These sites were described as environments where enslavement, forced labor, sexual exploitation, extortion for ransom, and the confiscation and resale of identity documents are routine.

The report also documented dangerous interception operations in the central Mediterranean Sea, involving excessive use of force and risky maneuvers. Many intercepted individuals are forcibly returned to Libya, where they face renewed abuse. It further cited repeated cases of collective expulsions to other countries, carried out without individual assessments, in violation of international human rights and refugee law.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk described the situation as a “nightmare,” while Hanna Tetteh said detention facilities had become breeding grounds for serious violations.

The report called on Libyan authorities to release all arbitrarily detained migrants, halt dangerous interceptions, decriminalize irregular migration, and end human trafficking and forced labor. It also urged the international community, including the European Union, to suspend returns to Libya until adequate human rights safeguards are in place and to strengthen search-and-rescue operations at sea.