Migrants from sub-Saharan African countries are seen on a street in the Tunisian capital, Tunis, on August 25, 2023. The migrants reportedly arrived in Tunisia without documents and took shelter on a street 200 meters from the building that houses the International Organization for Migration (IOM), a UN agency.
The situation for migrants in Tunisia has been difficult for months: Since Tunisian President Kais Said made a speech in February alleging that “hordes” of irregular migrants were causing crime and posing a demographic threat to the mainly Arab country, departures of sub-Saharan migrants to Europe have increased.
In mid-August, reports surfaced about a group of some 50 Black Africans, including a four-year-old girl, being held against their will in a high school in southwestern Tunisia after being rounded up, deported and then abandoned in the desert on the Libyan border in July. Despite being released this week, they reportedly lost their accommodation and their belongings.
Since mid-July, humanitarian organizations and UN agencies have reported that hundreds of migrants were found at Tunisia’s borders with its neighbours Algeria and Libya.
Human Rights Watch believes that at least 1,200 Black Africans were “expelled or forcibly transferred by Tunisian security forces” to these border regions. Tunisian authorities have denied bussing hundreds of migrants to these areas after allegedly rounding them up in cities across Tunisia.
However, eyewitness accounts, journalists and humanitarian organizations have provided evidence to the contrary.
But it’s not just sub-Saharan migrants trying to leave the country in increasing numbers: A severe economic crisis and shortages of basic supplies are said to have led to the rise in Tunisians deciding to risk the often deadly journey across the Mediterranean.
