But many of those who leave the coast of Bizerta that prospective praise far outweighs the risk. The ones who have relatives in Europe are the ones who have new cars and improvements in the kitchen.
“My son is a month and a half old, and if I have the chance to migrate without delay, I will do it with my life,” said Tarek Aloui, a 27-year-old who has tried ten times to succeed in Italy since 2014. He only succeeded once, last March at the height of the coronavirus lockdown, and was deported almost promptly to his home, where he was imprisoned for six months, and was not discouraged.
“All Tunisians, men, women and even young people must go this way,” he added.
Their arrivals have tested the ability of southern Italy regions to welcome them amid the coronavirus pandemic, given Italy’s quarantine needs for anyone arriving from outside the EU.
When a huge fishing boat of 450 Tunisians arrived at the port of the Sicilian island of Lampedusa on 30 August, some citizens went to the docks to protest and shouted at them to return. Former Italian Interior Minister Matteo Salvini criticized the government for letting them in and ironously noted that Maximum will never be granted asylum because they are fleeing the non-existent “Tunisian war. “
To keep new migrants safely away, the Italian government has ordered five ferries for newcomers to 14 full days of quarantine, with 2,238 lately aboard ships, but there are also ground hubs for others, and the Ministry of the Interior has complained that Tunisians, more than others, have a tendency to flee reception centres and escape quarantine requirements. Their escapes have sparked protests among local citizens for fear of additional infections after italy’s brutal coronavirus outbreak, especially as arriving migrants have connected with dozens of recent groups.
The Minister of the Interior, Luciana Lamorgese, has visited Tunisia twice since July to negotiate with the new government the desire to slow the flow, adding aid from Italy for further patrol of the coasts and blamed the increase in Tunisian arrivals to the country’s socio-economic situation. problems, which were aggravated through COVID-19, and presented Italian assistance to address them.
He told a parliamentary committee last week that since 1 August, Italy had resumed the repatriation of Tunisians who were not eligible for asylum, after reaching an agreement with the Tunisian government to settle for two weekly flights with 40 Tunisians each. The number of weekly flights would increase from October. Tunisian migrants fleeing economic deterioration in their country are not considered eligible for asylum.
While Tunisians went through the largest migrant organization in 2020, the 23517 migrants in Italy this year are only a fraction of the nearly 120,000 other people rescued at sea and brought to Italy in 2017, or the more than 181,000 arrivals in the peak year. . , 2016. However, this year’s arrivals are higher than in the last two years.
More surprising is the proportion of Tunisian migrants: 9,284 or 42% this year, with 23% last year and 22% in 2018. Last year, Tunisians accounted for only 5% of arrivals, with Nigerians as the most sensitive on the list.
Romdhane Ben Amor, spokesman for the Tunisian Economic and Social Rights Forum, said this point of emigration has been observed since the start of the 2011 Arab Spring uprising in Tunisia.
“It is no longer limited to those who drop out of school, the unemployed and the uned education,” he said.
He said between 150 and 200 families had left Tunisia by boat, avoiding the coastguards of the North African country despite increased surveillance funded through Italy and other European Union countries.
“We can see them in the port surveillance chamber,” said Mohammed Taweb, a fisherman from Bizerte, who claimed that small teams were seaplane engines in preparation for their departure, but only boats of excitement, not fishing boats that he and others needed to make a living. He said he understood why they were leaving and that the idea of the Tunisian government was to solve the problem.
Ghofrane Hlel’s parents are concerned that it will be too late for their son, who left last September at the age of 20 and lost at sea. His mother, Kalthoum Fraj, resigned he himself to his fate, but not to uncertainty.
“I settle for everything that’s happened to him and I don’t take responsibility,” he said. “I need him dead or alive, and I’ll settle for one or the other. “
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Nicole Winfield in Rome and Lori Hinnant in Paris contributed to this report.
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