Photo credit: Euractiv
Thirty-eight African migrants have been arrested in Tunisia after fighting with coastguards who intercepted their boat. The migrants were trying to sail to Europe.
Barron’s reports that the migrants were said to have attacked a coastguard who had tried to stop them from setting off from the coast of Sfax, Tunisia’s main departure point for Italy.
The spokesman for the Sfax governorate court, Hichem Ben Ayyad, said, “When they were surrounded, the migrants threw stones at the coastguards and seized a small boat aboard which they found a security agent whose hands they later tied.”
The migrants reportedly pushed another security agent not the sea after injuring him in the chest.
Tunisia and Libya are major departure points for migrants attempting dangerous European crossings.
