The migrants, from countries such as the Ivory Coast, Senegal, Guinea, and Cameroon, were found stranded on the Algerian side of the border with Niger on Sunday.  A senior municipal official in the northern Niger city was quoted by AFP as saying the migrants had been "abandoned" in "the usual atrocious conditions near the border with Niger".

The International Organization for Migration (IOM) has been taking care of the migrants, many of whom are sick. The migrants said that they were dumped at the border and were left with very little food and water and walked a good 50 kilometers before being rescued, AFP reports.

Algerian Interior Ministry official Hassan Kacimi struck back at allegations over Algeria abandoning migrants at the border. "What the IOM is not saying is that it does not do anything to help them (when they are in Algeria). It is Algeria that provides them with assistance by distributing food kits and water," he said. 

During a meeting on border security between Niger and Algeria, Algerian Interior Minister Noureddine Bedoui also chimed in on the matter: "Algeria has always supported African migrants and spared no effort, including humanitarian, to lend them aid and assistance."    

Mass expulsions from Algeria

The Associated Press reported that Algeria had left more than 13,000 migrants in the desert of Niger and Mali since May 2017, leaving them to wander through hostile terrain in temperatures well above 40 C (104 F). Algeria has an agreement with Niger to deport its citizens by convoy direclty to the city of Agadez whereas migrants from other countries have been rounded up in sweeps and trucked to desert strips on the border.

"Algeria has the power to control its borders, but that doesn't mean it can round up people based on the color of their skin and dump them in the desert, regardless of their legal status and without a shred of due process," Sarah Leah Whitson of Human Rights Watch said.

In May, the African Union lashed out at the Algerian government due to its treatment of migrants in a statement. "We cannot accept African countries ill-treating Africans, even if they enter the country illegally," the chairman of the African Union Commission, Moussa Faki Mahamat, said earlier last week in Ethiopia's capital Addis Ababa.

IOM, EU efforts

The European Union, in an attempt to tackle migration, asked Algeria in late June whether the country would be willing to set up centers to accommodate asylum seekers. The Algerian government refused, along with Tunisia and several other nations.

The IOM has conducted 18 rescue missions in the border area since the start of 2018 involving 3,000 people. Border crossings by foot have risen sharply, up from 135 in May 2017 to 2,888 in April this year.