Many Nigerians and Ivoriens living in Tunisia are fleeing their homes and taking refuge at their country's embassies as attacks by Tunisians on blacks in the country escalate, according to a report by Diplomatic Info.
The attacks were sparked by
Tunisia’s president Kais Saied recent claim that the migrants from sub-Saharan Africa have come to change the country's Islamic Arab identity and their presence has to end.
"There is a criminal plan to change the composition of the demographic landscape in Tunisia and some individuals have received large sums of money to give residence to sub-Saharan migrants,” he said in a statement.
At Tunisia's national security council meeting called on the matter, Mr. Saied described the migrants as “hordes of illegal migrants,” and argued that they are a source of “violence, crime, and unacceptable acts,” in the country.
Mr. Saied insisted that there was a “need to quickly put an end” to the migration as it was an “unspoken goal to consider Tunisia a purely African country, with no affiliation to the Arab and Islamic nations.”
Analysts, however, say the African migrants have been sustaining the country’s informal economy with a surplus of cheap labor.
Since Mr. Saied's announcement, hundreds of sub-Saharan African migrants have been targeted with the majority losing their housing, jobs, and freedom.
An advocacy group in Tunisia, Forum Tunisien Pour les Droits Economiques et Sociaux (FTDES) disclosed that over 300 migrants have been arrested on trumped-up charges in the onslaught.
While condemning the assault on the rights of the migrants, FTDES called on the Tunisian government to, instead “fight against hate speech, discrimination and racism against them.”
The group also asked Tunisian authorities to “intervene in the event of an emergency to guarantee the dignity and rights of migrants.”
“(We) call on the Tunisian government to respect its commitments to the implementation of international agreements on the rights of migrant workers and refugees, as well as the recommendations of the Universal Periodic Review and The Committee on the Protection of Migrant Workers,” FTDES added.
The actions of the government of Tunisia violate the African Charter on Human Rights and Peoples and the country's commitments under the 1951 Geneva Convention on Refugees which Tunisia adopted in 1957.
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