Tunisian security forces in Sfax have rounded up hundreds of people from sub-Saharan Africa, including children, and dropped them in a no man’s land between the Tunisian and Libyan border, where they remain trapped with neither food nor water. These forced deportations carried out by the security services come against a backdrop of heightened anti-migrant rhetoric and violence that broke out in Sfax the night of July 3. Our team spoke to a man from the Ivory Coast who said that some people had died and more than 300 people are trapped at the border in terrible conditions.
Our team spoke to a man from the Ivory Coast, who we are calling Adama, who told us that Tunisian security forces forcibly deported him, along with about 20 other migrants, dropping them off at the border on the night of July 2. This was a day before clashes broke out in Sfax. The ongoing violence has been accompanied by a wave of migrant arrests.
