The Tunisian Coast Guard “rescued eleven illegal migrants of several African nationalities after the sinking of their boats”
A sea tomb. The Mediterranean is once again the scene of a tragedy when at least 29 migrants from sub-Saharan African countries died of drowning in three shipwrecks off the coast of Tunisia. Twenty-nine bodies were recovered, the Tunisian coastguard said in a statement on Sunday, adding that it had “rescued eleven illegal migrants of several African nationalities after the sinking of their boats” off the east coast of Tunisia.
A Tunisian trawler has recovered 19 bodies after a boat sank 58 kilometers offshore. A coastguard patrol found eight bodies off the coastal town of Mahdia and rescued 11 migrants whose boat, heading for Italy, capsized, while trawlers recovered two other bodies.
The hostility of the Tunisian government toward migrants
Several dozen migrants have died in a series of shipwrecks and others have been missing since President Kais Saied’s violent speech on February 21 on illegal immigration. After this speech, a good number of the 21,000 nationals of sub-Saharan Africa officially registered in Tunisia, most of them in an irregular situation, had lost their jobs, generally informal, and their housing overnight, because of the campaign against illegal immigrants.
President Emmanuel Macron and the President of the Italian Council of Ministers Giorgia Meloni called on Friday to support Tunisia, which is facing a serious financial crisis, in order to contain the “migration pressure” that this country represents for Europe. Rome fears an explosion in the flow of migrants to its coasts, favored by economic and political difficulties in Tunisia, but also by mild weather as summer approaches, facilitating crossings.
Risk of “collapse” of the state
Tunisia has been negotiating for several months with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for a loan of nearly two billion dollars, but discussions between the two parties seem to have stalled since an agreement in principle was announced in mid-October.
The head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell, for his part warned on Monday that the situation in Tunisia was “very dangerous”, even evoking a risk of “collapse” of the State likely to “cause migratory flows towards EU and cause instability in the MENA region” (Middle East and North Africa). An analysis is described as “disproportionate” and rejected by Tunis.
