By Leila Fadel of the Washington Post

Vivienne looked out through the bars of the Tripoli jail cell where rebel authorities had held her for five days. She is one of a group of 90 Nigerian migrants who were rounded up during the climactic battle here last month against Moammar Gaddafi's troops, accused of possessing weapons and killing Libyans.

Vivienne said her only crime is her black skin.

"They think because we are black, we are fighting for Gaddafi," she said this week, afraid to give her last name. "We were hiding. We were afraid. There were gunshots and bombs." Around her, other women - hairdressers, housekeepers, one pregnant - told the same story.

More than 1.5 million sub-Saharan Africans are thought to work in Libya, a country of 6.5 million, according to Refugees International, most of them as low-paid day laborers. The International Organization for Migration said that it has evacuated about 1,400 migrants from the capital and that about 800 others have taken refuge in the fishing port of Janzour, west of the city.

Peter Bouckaert, the emergencies director for Human Rights Watch, said there was violence throughout the uprising against black Libyans and sub-Saharan Africans in the capital, adding that his group had confirmed Gaddafi's use of foreign mercenaries there. The persecution, he added, was still going on.

"It really is racist violence against all dark-skinned people," Bouckaert said. "This situation for Africans in Tripoli is dire."

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