EuroMed Rights is deeply concerned by the unprecedented violence against Black people in Tunisia in recent days.
Security forces have raided and dismantled makeshift camps in the areas of Sfax, El Amra and Jebeniana were hundreds of people -primarily from Sudan, Mali, Gambia, Guinea, and Ivory Coast, among other Sub-Saharan African countries—had been living. Hate campaigns against them, the lack of residency, protection, housing and shelters, coupled with a severe socio-economic crisis in Tunisia, are fuelling growing wave of racist and violent attacks against migrants, asylum seekers and refugees.
Reports of armed civilian groups shooting at Black people indiscriminately are on the rise. On Wednesday, 9 April 2025, a 32-year-old Guinean national tragically lost his life after being shot by a Tunisian civilian— just days after the killing, under similar circumstances, of a 38-year-old Malian migrant – underscoring the deadly consequences of unchecked racial violence.
Refoulements and deportations after interceptions
On 17 March, following an interception operation at sea by Tunisian authorities near off Sfax – in which at least 18 people lost their lives- around 600 migrants from sub-Saharan African countries were stranded in the desert and forcibly deported to the border with Algeria and Libya.
According to testimonies, most of the people deported to the Libyan border were Sudanese.
Escalating violence against migrants also in Libya
Since March, mass and arbitrary arrests and attacks, including house burned, took place in Libya, targeting mainly the Sudanese, Eritrean and Ethiopian communities, including pregnant women.
Since the beginning of April, Libyan authorities have also announced the closure of ten international NGOs providing vital assistance to migrants, asylum seekers and refugees. The NGOs have been accused of “aiming at altering the country’s demographic composition and posing a threat to Libyan society.” – a deeply troubling justification that undermines humanitarian principles and criminalizes solidarity.
Cooperation with the EU
It is unfortunately not new that migrants in both Tunisia and Libya experience a continuum of violence ranging from verbal abuse to torture, slavery and murder. However, the widespread violence is reaching an unprecedented level.
At the same time, despite the numerous reports and testimonies, the last years have been marked by a proliferation of externalization agreements, such as the EU-Tunisia MoU in 2023, or the recent EU proposal on returns and “return hubs”, aims at speeding up forced returns to non-EU countries, such as Tunisia.
Without adequate safeguards, these controversial agreements only risks financing the repression of migratory movements by third countries, which have become the EU’s border guards, and fuel unimaginable suffering, violence and deaths.
EuroMed Rights calls on Tunisian and Libyan authorities to immediately halt the racist violence and repression against migrants, asylum seekers and refugees; to conduct investigations and held accountable those involved in these indiscriminate attacks; and, to stop the crackdown and criminalisation of activists and NGOs who work in solidarity with migrants. EuroMed Rights also calls on the EU and its Member States to suspend funding arrangements on migration cooperation and border control with Tunisia and Libya and use them instead to save lives at sea and ensure safe routes.