{"id":43506,"date":"2026-08-22T17:48:26","date_gmt":"2026-08-22T15:48:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/?post_type=news&#038;p=43506"},"modified":"2026-08-22T17:48:26","modified_gmt":"2026-08-22T15:48:26","slug":"at-least-13-tunisians-missing-after-migrant-boat-sinks-off-tunisia","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/at-least-13-tunisians-missing-after-migrant-boat-sinks-off-tunisia\/","title":{"rendered":"At least 13 Tunisians missing after migrant boat sinks off Tunisia"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>At least 13 Tunisians are missing after a \u200bmigrant boat sank off the Tunisian coast while sailing towards Italy and \u200ctwo people have been rescued, the head of a migrant rights group said this Saturday.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The boat, which set off early on Thursday, was carrying mostly young people, including seven members of the \u200bsame family, as well as a man and his pregnant wife, Mostafa<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The \u2060central Mediterranean route from the North African coast is one of the world&#8217;s deadliest \u200bmigration routes, used by migrants from Africa and the Middle East seeking to reach \u200bEurope, often in overcrowded or unseaworthy boats.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>One of the two survivors told rescuers they had been stranded at sea for hours after their vessel capsized. The second survivor was in critical condition, said \u200bAbdelkebir, whose group monitors migration issues.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>National Guard Spokesperson Houssem Eddine Jebabli said coastguard \u200bunits, backed by an aircraft and naval units, were conducting search operations for the missing migrants.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Abdelkebir said \u200cfour \u2060bodies had been recovered, but it could not be confirmed whether they were migrants from the same boat.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Tunisia was once a major departure point for migrants crossing the Mediterranean, but departures have fallen sharply over the past two years amid a crackdown \u200band tighter maritime controls, \u200bbacked by European \u2060Union (EU) funding and modern border-monitoring equipment, particularly from Italy.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and dozens of other human rights and humanitarian groups said \u200bin a statement last month that the EU-Tunisia migration deal \u200bhad fuelled \u2060and normalised serious abuses against migrants and asylum seekers in Tunisia.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The groups called on the EU to suspend funding for migration and border-control activities involving Tunisian security forces.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Tunisia has not \u2060commented \u200bon the statement but has repeatedly said it is \u200bbearing the brunt of a major migration influx. President Kais Saied said in 2023 that the influx \u200bwas aimed at changing the country&#8217;s demographic makeup.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>&#8211;Reuters&#8211;<\/div>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":22145,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[78,26],"class_list":["post-43506","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-featured","news-type-general_news","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"Abdelkebir said \u200cfour \u2060bodies had been recovered.","published_date":"","news_description":"Abdelkebir said \u200cfour \u2060bodies had been recovered.","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/43506","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/43506\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43507,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/43506\/revisions\/43507"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22145"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43506"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=43506"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}