2023-07-06 17:56:53
A surge of violence fueled by calls for revenge fell on Tuesday and Wednesday on migrants from sub-Saharan Africa in Sfax, following one of them, presented as Cameroonian by the authorities, killed a resident of the city during a brawl.
The incident sparked fire in a town whose residents were proclaiming their exasperation with the presence of illegal migrants in their town, where large numbers of them are settling in awaiting an illegal crossing to the Italy aboard makeshift boats.
An increasingly openly xenophobic discourse once morest these migrants has spread since Tunisian President Kais Saied condemned illegal immigration in February, presenting it as a demographic threat to his country.
In the followingmath of the deadly brawl, dozens of African migrants were expelled from Sfax by the security forces, to the cheers of the local population.
According to NGOs, hundreds of them were taken in buses to desert areas in southern Tunisia, some of them near the border with Libya and others that of Algeria. Many migrants had arrived in Tunisia illegally from these two countries.
“Agents of the (Tunisian) national guard caught us in Sfax following breaking our house,” he added. He claims to have been taken on board a bus near the Algerian border with a dozen other migrants with whom he shared accommodation in Sfax.
“Attempting the Crossing”
Before coming to Tunisia, where he lived off odd jobs, Mr. Koné had worked for two years in Libya, but the conflict that was ravaging the country forced him to leave.
“I came because I had heard that in Tunisia we respect human rights, but what is happening shows that this is not the reality”, he is in despair.
According to Mr. Koné and other witnesses, at least a thousand migrants found themselves on Thursday completely destitute in this desert area following being expelled from Sfax.
Mamadou Dembélé, another 31-year-old Malian, thought he was on his way to realizing his dream of immigrating to Europe when the boat transporting him to the Italian coast with 46 other migrants was intercepted on Wednesday by the Tunisian coast guard off from Sfax.
Instead of disembarking on the Italian island of Lampedusa as planned, he found himself in the desert in southern Tunisia on Thursday where he was taken with other African migrants by Tunisian security forces.
Came to Tunisia five months ago “to attempt the crossing” to Europe, he says he does not want to “return to Algeria” from where he arrived by illegally crossing the border.
“I stayed six months in Algeria to try to go to Europe from there but it didn’t work so I came to try my luck from Tunisia,” he confides on the phone.
“In Mali, there is conflict, that’s why I left. I wanted to go to Europe to work, to help my family,” he adds.
In addition to those forcibly transferred to the desert, dozens of migrants, fearing reprisals from the local population, rushed to the Sfax railway station on Wednesday and Thursday to go to other Tunisian cities.
“I want to go back to my country. It’s my destination,” he adds.
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