Tunisia: Authorities set fire to migrant camp

Officials in Tunisia have burned down the tents of thousands of irregular migrants at an informal camp to the north of the port city of Sfax. The government says it is pursuing a policy of leaving migrants no other option but to accept voluntary returns to their home countries.

The deliberate destruction of the informal tents in El Amra, located about 30 kilometers outside the port city of Sfax, comes as the Tunisian government continues to pursue a heavy-handed approach dealing with irregular migrants.

In a video posted by one of the affected migrants on X, black smoke is seen billowing out of tents in almost every direction of the site amid an overall atmosphere of fear and anger among the migrants.

The man filming the video repeats multiple times in French that everything is now destroyed and that none of the former residents of the informal camp know where else to go now.

The Tunisian Police and security forces leave nothing untouched. They are burning the tents— the only shelter migrants could offer themselves. They rob them of their hard-earned resources, live them stranded and then problematise them when they try to survive. pic.twitter.com/O8cZKhUgZQ

— Refugees In Libya (@RefugeesinLibya) 24 April 2025

Authorities have systematically been trying to dismantle the camp in El Amra since the beginning of April, resulting in the uprooting of thousands of migrants in recent weeks already, according to the spokesman for the National Guard, Houcem Eddine Jebabli.

Another 3,300 migrants were now also forced out after the latest efforts by the government involving the destructive use of fire to raze the tents at the informal camp to the ground.

One of the migrants who was forced to vacate his tent this week told the AFP news agency that life had become increasingly difficult in the two years that he had been in Tunisia, and that after the latest development, many just wanted to return to their home countries.

Stranded in Tunisia

The informal camp has long been a thorn in the side for authorities and locals alike since migrants first started building tents and other informal structures there about two years ago.

Situated around olive groves and known as Kilometer Marker 33, residents have been asking for the land to be cleared amid growing animosities between migrants and locals.

Many of the migrants there have been stranded in Tunisia for a long time. With tighter controls on the Mediterranean Sea, their hopes of reaching Europe are being dashed daily, effectively resulting in many of the migrants becoming stranded in Tunisia.

After signing a 255-million-euro agreement with European Union last year to further limit irregular migration to Europe, Tunisia is likely only going to become a more restrictive place for migrants.

A divisive strategy to discourage migrants

Tunisian President Kais Saied, known for his often fiery, anti-migrant rhetoric, meanwhile seeks to continue pushing migrants into further despair to get them to agree to voluntary return to their home countries with the help of the International Organization for Migration (IOM).

The IOM said on Thursday that it had organized the return of 7,000 migrants in 2024 and that so far this year, over 2,300 migrants had also been sent back home using IOM channels.

National Guard spokesman Jebabli said that the Tunisian government was working closely with the IOM and with the countries of departure, of welcome as well as the international NGOs to ensure voluntary repatriation.

It’s the strategy of the State that Tunisia not be a place of settlement or transit for illegal migrants, he added.

Original article

Also related:

Earlier this month, Tunisian authorities dismantled makeshift camps housing 7,000 sub-Saharan African migrants and begun forcibly deporting some of them, a senior official told Reuters on Saturday, as the country grapples with an unprecedented migrant crisis.

Tunisia’s government said about 20,000 of migrants live in tents in forests in southern towns, such as Amra and Jbeniana, after authorities prevented them from travelling across the Mediterranean.

Migrants have frequently clashed with local residents, who want them deported from their area.

Local human rights groups have criticised the authorities, accusing them of racist rhetoric, incitement against migrants and condemning a crackdown that led to the imprisonment of activists who helped African migrants.

Source: Reuters, 5 April 2025.

Photo in front page: The remains of tents belonging to irregular migrants, who had only minutes to gather their most-precious belongings before the tents were razed to the ground. The operation to burn down the migrant tents was chiefly facilitated by Tunisia’s National Guard. Source: Reuters. Photo on this page: Members of Tunisian security forces dispense disinfectants as they dismantle a makeshift camp for migrants from sub-Saharan Africa at Kerkennah farm at al-Amra on the outskirts of the Tunisian city of Sfax on 24 April

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