It is in makeshift shelters that asylum seekers live in front of the headquarters of the International Organization for Migration in Tunis. They took up residence there on Wednesday. The day before, the Tunisian police had dismantled their improvised camp in front of the building of the High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
Unlike migrants, these refugees cannot return home for fear of reprisals. And have been calling for help ever since, to no avail.
” We asked [au HCR] a simple solution, but they did nothing. They [le HCR] contacted the authorities to ask for protection. But protect them from whom? Refugees who fled the war? Protect them from children? Of people seeking refuge?” asks Nasra Mohammed, a Yemeni asylum seeker.
Omar Khaled, a 17-year-old Sudanese asylum seeker, had a job since his arrival in Tunisia in November 2022. But he found himself unemployed, and on the street after the statements of the Tunisian president.
“After I was fired, I went to see the organization [le HCR] and I asked them to find a solution to my problem. I am unemployed and homeless, and I have nowhere to go. They told me they had hired a lawyer to discuss [de la situation] with the state [tunisien] to find a solution to our problems. They told me that there were many refugees who had been fired in the same way.”; he says.
While they cannot turn to the embassies of their country of origin fearing for their safety, these men and women ask to be sent elsewhere than in Tunisia.
Source: Africanews