TUNISIA’S president said Monday that his country doesn’t want to be Europe’s border guard or a land of resettlement for migrants rejected elsewhere.
President Kais Saied made the comment after meeting in Tunis with the French and German interior ministers amid an effort by European governments to work with Tunisia to prevent more deadly migration efforts across the Mediterranean.
Tunisia has become one of the main stepping-off points for migrants hoping to cross from Africa into Europe, and European officials are offering Tunisia ever-growing amounts of aid to try to slow the flow. Most of those fleeing war or misery are from sub-Saharan Africa but many are from Tunisia, which is experiencing its worst economic crisis in a generation.
The visit by the French and German interior ministers, who oversee migration policy for the biggest powers in the European Union, was the third high-level European visit to Tunisia in two weeks. It came after an overcrowded trawler capsized last week off Greece, leaving at least 80 people dead and hundreds missing as they sought to reach Italy from Libya.
