A Region on the Move - 2018 Mobility Overview in the Horn of Africa and the Arab Peninsula

832,989 movements were tracked through IOM’s Displacement Tracking Matrix (DTM) in East and the Horn of Africa (EHoA) in 2018. Thirty-eight per cent of the movements were tracked along the Eastern Route, fifty-two per cent along the Horn of Africa Route, four per cent along the Northern Route and six per cent along the Southern Route. Thirty per cent intended to travel to Somalia, thirty per cent were migrating towards KSA, fifteen per cent were headed to Ethiopia, eight per cent to Yemen and seven per cent to Djibouti. With regards to the Northern/Sinai Route, 52,441 refugees and asylum seekers from EHoA countries were registered in Egypt as of December 2018 – Ethiopian (30%), Eritrean (29%), South Sudanese (27%), and Somali (14%). An estimated 230,000 Ethiopians returned from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) to Ethiopia since April 2017 to December 2018. Out of the 188,284 registered upon arrival, eighty-six per cent reported that they were returning involuntarily and fourteen per cent were voluntary returns.