Tunisia under the shock after new migrants' tragedy

June 06, 2018

Credits: TV5Monde

It was last October: in a shipwreck off the Tunisian island of Kerkennah 46 people trying to reach Europe died. Among them, 11 young people from the village of Bir Lafaï. That month, nearly 2,800 Tunisians arrived in Sicily irregularly, an absolute record: before that, Tunisians trying to cross the Mediterranean were barely a few dozen each month.

In last Sunday's tragedy, four new corpses were recovered by the Tunisian Navy, bringing to 52 the number of migrants who drowned in the open waters off Sfax. "48 bodies were identified: 36 Tunisians and 12 migrants from sub-Saharan Africa," told AFP the spokesman of the Ministry of the Interior, Khlifa Chibani. Sixty-eight people were rescued - including 60 Tunisians - but the death toll is still tentative, with survivors reporting the presence of at least 180 people on board at the time of the sinking.