More than 100 African migrants have abandoned an "open" Israeli detention centre to try to march on Jerusalem in protest at a law allowing authorities to keep them in custody indefinitely, activists have said. The protest coincided with an appeal filed in Israel's Supreme Court by human rights groups against the new law, which also stipulated that new migrants caught entering the country illegally could be jailed in a standard prison for up to a year.
Cheska Katz, of the Hotline for Refugees and Migrants rights group, said that 135 men, mostly from Sudan, decided not to return to the centre on Sunday night and instead set out for Jerusalem, about 75 kms away.
"They aren't trying to elude the authorities. Their aim is to reach the Knesset and ask for their freedom and to be recognised as refugees," the activist, who is taking part in the march, told the Reuters news agency.
Cheska Katz, of the Hotline for Refugees and Migrants rights group, said that 135 men, mostly from Sudan, decided not to return to the centre on Sunday night and instead set out for Jerusalem, about 75 kms away.
"They aren't trying to elude the authorities. Their aim is to reach the Knesset and ask for their freedom and to be recognised as refugees," the activist, who is taking part in the march, told the Reuters news agency.
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