Almost 100 African migrants and asylum seekers who had been camped outside the UNHCR headquarters in the capital city of Tunis for almost 25 days were dispersed on Tuesday by Tunisian police using tear gas.
The group, which included representatives from 15 sub-Saharan nations, said in an open letter that they had “taken refuge” there after being “chased out” of many Tunisian cities in the wake of President Kais Saied’s address criticizing illegal immigration in February.
Locals, however, complained that they were “blocking the passage” and that individuals could “no longer leave their homes” and were not pleased with their presence.
“This is a big problem because when they gather like this they feel stronger, they feel safe and they don’t fear the police,” said resident Elyes Ben Zakour.
“They don’t care about people or women, they don’t respect the elderly or the young They don’t care about anything. If you pass by here, they can hit you and tell you to leave,” he said.
Famoussa Koita, a Malian asylum seeker, claimed that while he had completed his resettlement interview and got his status, others were growing impatient with the UN organization due to the protracted delay in handling their applications.
“There are others like me who have been here for more than two or three years and they have not been summoned. This is due to the application procedures,” he said.
Koita added that the UNHCR could not deal with all them and so it was up to the asylum seekers to “understand that there are a lot of applications and they can’t be processed all at the same time”.
On 3 April, the agency in Tunisia announced on its Facebook page that it had stopped “all registration and pre-registration activities from 31 March to 17 April due to a migration of the registration and identity system”.
“All UNHCR operations worldwide” were affected by this “temporary” stoppage. After the migrants were scattered, according to an AFP reporter who was on the site, they noticed that the UN building’s security cameras and windows had been broken.
According to Faker Bouzghaya, a spokesman for the Tunisian Interior Ministry, the police intervened “at the request of the UNHCR” and 80 migrants were detained, 30 of whom were brought into custody.
