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About 800 Migrants Drowned off Tunisia's Coast This Year

Migrants gather near Ras Ajdir to demand that authorities send medicine and food aid. (EPA)
Migrants gather near Ras Ajdir to demand that authorities send medicine and food aid. (EPA)
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About 800 Migrants Drowned off Tunisia's Coast This Year

Migrants gather near Ras Ajdir to demand that authorities send medicine and food aid. (EPA)
Migrants gather near Ras Ajdir to demand that authorities send medicine and food aid. (EPA)

About 800 migrants have drowned off Tunisia's coast this year as they tried to reach Europe by boat, National Guard spokesman Houcem Eddine Jebabli told Agence France-Presse (AFP).

Jebabli said that 789 bodies of migrants were recovered from the sea, including 102 Tunisians, other foreigners, and unidentified people.

He said that between January 1 to June 20, 34,290 migrants were intercepted and rescued, including 30,587 foreigners, mostly from sub-Saharan Africa, compared to 9,217 people who were intercepted or retrieved during the same period in 2022.

The Coast Guard carried out 1,310 operations in the first six months, more than double the number of missions last year.

Tunisia, with some coasts less than 150 km from Italy's Lampedusa Island, has become a significant gateway for irregular migrants and asylum-seekers, often from sub-Saharan Africa.

Italian authorities say more than 80,000 people have crossed the Mediterranean and reached the Italian coast since the beginning of the year, compared to 33,000 last year during the same period, most of them from the Tunisian and Libyan coasts.

Tunisian Interior Minister Kamal Feki said Wednesday that the Tunisian Coast Guard had recovered 901 bodies by July 20 following maritime accidents in the Mediterranean Sea.

Tunisia has replaced Libya as the main departure point for people fleeing poverty and conflict in Africa and the Middle East searching for a better life in Europe.

Feki told the Parliament that among the 901 bodies found, 36 were Tunisians, and 267 were foreign immigrants, while the identity of the rest is unknown.

Most of the boats carrying migrants depart from Sfax. Thousands of migrants without identity papers flocked to the coastal city, especially in the past few months, to travel to Europe in boats run by smugglers, leading to an unprecedented migration crisis in Tunisia.

Official data showed that about 75,065 migrants arrived in Italy by boat until July 14, compared to 31,920 in the same period last year. More than half of them left from Tunisia.

Last week, the European Union and Tunisia signed a memorandum of understanding for a "strategic and comprehensive partnership" on illegal migration, economic development, and renewable energy.

Hundreds of African migrants, including pregnant women and children, are still abandoned in Ras Ajdir between Libya and Tunisia after Tunisian authorities sent them there, according to testimonies collected by AFP.

About 140 migrants from sub-Saharan Africa said they had been in the area without water or food for three weeks and set up a transit camp 30 meters from the Libyan Ras Ajdir border checkpoint.

Following clashes that killed a Tunisian citizen earlier in July, dozens of African migrants were expelled from Sfax and transferred to border areas with Libya and Algeria.

Over the past ten days, Libyan border guards have taken in hundreds of migrants wandering in the desert south of Ras Ajdir, where at least five bodies were found.

Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Tunisian police expelled up to 1,200 African migrants in July to remote desert areas along Tunisia's borders with Libya and Algeria.

On July 10, the Tunisian Red Crescent relocated 600 on the Libyan side and hundreds on the Algerian side to shelters.

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Arab World

After a Decade in Türkiye, a Syrian Refugee Rushes to Return Home, but Reality Hits

Syria refugee Ahmed al-Kassem and his family are welcomed by relatives as they return to their home in Aleppo, Syria, Friday, Dec. 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Khalil Hamra)
Syria refugee Ahmed al-Kassem and his family are welcomed by relatives as they return to their home in Aleppo, Syria, Friday, Dec. 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Khalil Hamra)
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After a Decade in Türkiye, a Syrian Refugee Rushes to Return Home, but Reality Hits

Syria refugee Ahmed al-Kassem and his family are welcomed by relatives as they return to their home in Aleppo, Syria, Friday, Dec. 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Khalil Hamra)
Syria refugee Ahmed al-Kassem and his family are welcomed by relatives as they return to their home in Aleppo, Syria, Friday, Dec. 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Khalil Hamra)

The moment he arrived home to Syria from Türkiye, Ahmed al-Kassem held his sister in a tight embrace, tears streaming down their faces. They hadn't seen each other in more than a decade and now were reunited only days after the fall of Syrian President Bashar Assad.
But soon, the former refugee’s joy was tinged by uncertainty about the future of his war-torn homeland. His old house in the city of Aleppo was too damaged to live in, and the family home he had brought his wife and children to had no electricity or running water.
“If I had known, I don’t know if I would have come,” the 38-year-old al-Kassem said. “Our life in Türkiye was not perfect, but what we are seeing here is a disaster.”
Al-Kassem and his family are among the more than 7,600 Syrian refugees who Turkish officials say have crossed back into Syria from Türkiye since Dec. 9 when Assad was swept out of power by the opposition factions. Thousands more have come back from neighboring Lebanon. The Associated Press documented the return of al-Kassem's family, from their crossing out of Türkiye with a truckload of belongings on Dec. 13 to their first days in Aleppo, a city still scarred by the long civil war.
They leave behind a life they built in Türkiye over the past 11 years. Four of his five children were born in Türkiye and know Syria and their relatives here only through video chats. For al-Kassem and his wife, it’s a chance to rejoin their family, resume their lives, and introduce their kids -- three girls and two boys aged 7 to 14 -- to their Syrian heritage.
But it’s a dive into the unknown of a new Syria still being formed. There’s little chance Türkiye will let them back.
At Türkiye’s Oncupinar border crossing, they waited in line for hours and then had to hand over to Turkish officials the “temporary protection” documents that certified their refugee status and right to be in the country.
On the Syrian side of the border, known as Bab al-Salameh, they unloaded their belongings – including a carpet and a washing machine – from the Turkish truck and placed them into another truck and van.
For an hour, they rode across northwest Syria until they reached Aleppo’s Masaken Hanano district. By now it was after nightfall, and the neighborhood was shrouded in darkness, with no electricity. They passed buildings destroyed or damaged years ago in fighting.
Using the light on his mobile phone, al-Kassem led his family down a dark alleyway and found his sister’s one-story house. It was intact but dark. There in front of the house, he had his tearful reunion with his sister. The kids hugged their cousins for the first time.
But the initial reality was hard.
When AP journalists met al-Kassem again three days later, he had sent his children to another relative’s house because his sister’s home had no electricity or running water. The relative’s house at least had a few hours of each every day, he said.
Al-Kassem wondered if he made the right decision bringing his family back so soon.
“When I saw my country liberated, I got up and returned with my children, to introduce them to our homeland and show them their country,” al-Kassem said. “But when my children came here and saw the situation, they were really surprised. They didn’t expect this.”
In Türkiye, they had water, electricity, the internet –“all life’s essentials were available,” he said. “But here, as you can see, we have been here for days with no water. I have no idea where I will go with my children.”
His 14-year-old daughter, Rawiya, said she was pleased to be reunited with her relatives. But she was worried about starting school in Aleppo after years in Turkish schools. She speaks Arabic but can’t read or write it.
“It will be difficult for me to start learning Arabic from zero,” said Rawiya. “Despite this, I’m happy to be in Syria.”
Rawiya was 4 when her family fled Aleppo in 2013. At the time, the opposition held the eastern districts of the city and fighting was ferocious with Assad’s forces holding the western half. A mosque behind al-Kassem’s house was repeatedly hit by shelling – and the day the shelling hit his house, he decided it was time to go.
They settled in the Turkish city of Kahramanmaras, where al-Kassem worked in construction, as he had in Aleppo. There, his other children were born and raised, becoming fluent in Turkish while speaking little Arabic.
Once a vital economic hub and Syria’s largest city, Aleppo was ravaged by years of fighting, until government forces with help from Russia and Iran finally recaptured the entire city in 2016. Much of the eastern section remains in ruins, many of the buildings still concrete skeletons with a few partially rebuilt by residents.
In Aleppo’s Old City, a Syrian revolutionary flag now hangs from the historic castle, where crowds continue to celebrate Assad’s downfall. Dozens of people strolled outside the ancient structure, some carrying or wearing the flag. The streets were filled with residents and visitors.
“We are here today to share the joy with everyone,” said Huzam Jbara, a mother from nearby Idlib province visiting Aleppo Castle with her two daughters for the first time in 10 years. “We are very happy, and we got rid of the tyrant who oppressed his people, killed his people, and locked them in prisons.”
In Aleppo’s Kostaki Homsi Street, lines stretched outside bakeries as people waited for bread — a sign of the widespread poverty in Syria’s wrecked economy.
In his first days back in Aleppo, al-Kassem found his old home in Masaken Hanano. The windows were shattered, all the belongings they left behind were gone.
He reflected on his life in Türkiye. They faced hardships there, including the COVID pandemic and a devastating 2023 earthquake. Now they will face hardships returning here, he said.
“But I have to adapt to the situation,” al-Kassem said. ” Why? Because it still is my homeland, my home, and our people are here.”