JOINT STATEMENT Tunisia is Not a Place of Safety for People Rescued at Sea
POLICY BRIEF
04 October 2024
In view of the rampant human rights violations against migrants, asylum seekers, and Entreprises humains refugees in Tunisia, especially those who et aredroits Black; Tunisia’s lack: of an asylum system; the Tunisian government’s crackdown on civil society,des judicial independence, and the media; and La Tunisie doit se saisir pleinement instruments internationaux the impossibility of fairly and individually determining nationalities or assessing the protection needs of migrants and asylum seekers while at sea, it is clear that Tunisia is not a safe place for the disembarkation of people intercepted or rescued at sea. The ongoing cooperation between the European Union (EU), EU member states, and Tunisia on migration control which includes reliance on the possibility to disembark people rescued or intercepted at sea in Tunisia – similar to previous cooperation with Libya – is contributing to human rights violations. European policies to externalize border management to Tunisia are supporting security authorities who are committing serious violations. They are also obstructing people’s rights to leave any country and to seek asylum, containing refugees and migrants in countries where their human rights are at risk. Moreover, disembarkation in Tunisia can endanger individuals and expose them to serious harm, and further puts refugees and migrants at high risk of collective expulsion to Libya and Algeria, which can violate the principle of non-refoulement. The establishment on 19 June 2024 of the Tunisian Search and Rescue Region (SRR), called for and supported by the European Commission, risks becoming another tool to violate people’s rights rather than a legitimate fulfillment of the responsibility to protect safety at sea. Mirroring its cooperation with Libya, the EU and its member states’ engagement with Tunisia may have the effect of normalizing serious violations against people seeking protection and undermining the integrity of the international search and rescue system by twisting it to serve migration control purposes. As humanitarian and human rights organizations, we call on the EU and its member states to terminate their cooperation on migration control with Tunisian authorities responsible for serious human rights violations at sea and in Tunisia. Search and rescue NGOs and commercial ships should not be instructed to disembark anyone in Tunisia. Widespread and repeated violations of human rights Findings from Tunisian and international organizations, as well as UN bodies, over the past two years indicate that Tunisia cannot be considered a ‘Place of Safety’ for people intercepted or rescued at sea, most notably Black people as defined by the 1979 SAR Convention, the Maritime Safety Committee (MSC) and UN bodies. Despite being party to the 1951 UN Refugee Convention, Tunisia has no national asylum law or system. People who enter, stay in, or exit the country irregularly are criminalized by law.