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BAIDOA, Somalia (AP) - Authorities in northeastern Somalia on Sunday repatriated more than 1,000 Ethiopians whom smugglers were preparing to take across the Gulf of Aden to the promise of jobs and a better life in the Middle East.
The 1,370 migrants were sent home in the first wave of a government crackdown on smuggling illegal immigrants through Somalia's autonomous region of Puntland, said the region's interior minister, Mohamed Abdi Habsade. A Sept. 25 government order banned human smuggling.
The immigrants were taken to villages on the Ethiopian side of the border with Somalia, a resident, Sahal Abdi, told The Associated Press by telephone.
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