Tunisia dismantles encampments housing migrants stranded en route to Europe

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Tunisia dismantles encampments housing migrants stranded en route to Europe

2025-04-11 00:12 Last Updated At：00:22

EL AMRA, Tunisia (AP) — Tunisian authorities this week dismantled dozens of makeshift camps housing African migrants as part of a sweeping operation to clear areas along the country’s Mediterranean coastline and ease tensions with residents.

The makeshift camps, located on privately owned land, have long been the site of violent altercations between migrants and Tunisians from nearby El Amra and Jebeniana, two towns located north of Sfax, Tunisia's second largest city.

Brig. Gen. Hossam Eddine Jababli, spokesperson for Tunisia's national guard, told The Associated Press on Wednesday that the sweeps intended to ensure “health and safety.” He said roughly 200 migrants who were detained hailed from sub-Saharan countries.

Authorities also claimed to have seized caches of bladed weapons during the raids, and officials have since indicated that deportations may soon begin for those suspected of planning acts of violence.

They have previously suggested more than 20,000 people were sheltering in the camps, which are near a part of the coastline located less than 161 kilometers (60 miles) from the Italian islands that form the European Union’s outermost borders.

Tunisian security forces have ramped up efforts to prevent migrants from reaching or crossing the sea — a journey that can be deadly. As of the end of February, 432 migrants arrived in Italy after embarking off Tunisia’s coastline, according to the U.N. refugee agency.

The scope of the camps had long alarmed local communities and lawmakers. Tarek Mahdi, a parliamentarian from the region, told local radio that there were 17 camps in El Amra, where residents have staged protests.

Since the camps were dismantled, authorities said they had relocated migrants to state-owned lands in Bir Mellouli, southwest of Sfax.

Jababli confirmed the Tunisian government is collaborating with international migration organizations to facilitate voluntary repatriation for those who wish to return to their home countries.

Fears of forced expulsions and being bussed to Tunisia's desert borderlands — long common among migrant communities — again reemerged as authorities prepared to dismantle the camps.

Last week, several videos and messages went viral in social media groups where migrants regularly seek information urging people not to trust Tunisian authorities or the International Organization for Migration. The messages suggested without evidence that they may intend to deceive migrants into boarding buses under false pretenses to be deported to Algeria or Libya.

Addressing concerns over the dismantling of the camps, Tunisian President Kais Saied told journalists in Monastir on Sunday that the operation was conducted peacefully and without violence or coercion. He framed the actions as guided by moral and humanitarian principles and said that removing the camps prevented migrants from settling on private property.

Follow AP’s international coverage of migration at https://apnews.com/hub/migration

US Forest Service starts clearing homeless camp in Oregon national forest

2025-05-02 06:28 Last Updated At：06:31

BEND, Ore. (AP) — Dozens of homeless people who have been living in a national forest in central Oregon for years were being evicted Thursday by the U.S. Forest Service, as it closed the area for a wildfire prevention project that will involve removing smaller trees, clearing debris and setting controlled burns over thousands of acres.

The project has been on the books for years, and the decision to remove the encampment in the Deschutes National Forest comes two months after the Trump administration issued an executive order directing federal agencies to increase timber production and forest management projects aimed at reducing wildfire risk. It wasn’t immediately clear if the evictions were a result of that order, but homeless advocates seized on the timing on Thursday, as U.S. Forest Service officers blocked the access road.

“The fact that they are doing this with such vigor shortly after they announced that the forests would be opened up for logging I don’t think is a coincidence," said Jesse Rabinowitz, spokesperson for the National Homelessness Law Center.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture, which oversees the U.S. Forest Service, and the service’s Pacific Northwest Region did not immediately respond to emailed requests for comment.

“The closure does not target any specific user group and will restrict all access, including day use and overnight camping, while crews operate heavy machinery, conduct prescribed burns, and clean up hazardous materials,” Deschutes National Forest spokesperson Kaitlyn Webb said in an email. “It’s not safe for the public to be in the area while heavy machinery is operating, trees are being felled, mowing operations are active, and prescribed burning is occurring.”

Campers who had set up trailers, recreational vehicles and tents amidst the ponderosa pines in the Deschutes National Forest scrambled in the darkness Wednesday night to pack up and get their engines working again. Authorities closed the two-lane road in the early hours of Thursday morning, and it wasn’t immediately clear how many people were left in the forest by the afternoon, though some were unable to leave.

The U.S. Forest Service has been working for years on plans to close part of the Deschutes National Forest near Bend for forest restoration and wildfire mitigation. But the number of people living in that part of the forest has grown, with many losing homes during the coronavirus pandemic due to job losses and high housing costs, Rabinowitz said.

President Donald Trump’s administration has acted to roll back environmental safeguards around future logging projects on more than half of U.S. national forests, under an emergency designation that cites dangers from wildfires.

Whether the administration's move will boost lumber supplies as Trump envisioned in an executive order he signed in March remains to be seen. Former President Joe Biden’s administration also sought more logging in public forests to combat fires, which have become more intense amid drier and hotter conditions linked to climate change, yet U.S. Forest Service timber sales stayed relatively flat under his tenure.

The Cabin Butte Vegetation Management Project, a wildfire mitigation treatment on some 30,000 acres (12,000 hectares), is prompting the closures in the Deschutes National Forest.

The goal of the work is to reduce wildfire risk and restore damaged habitats where development encroaches on natural areas near Bend, Deschutes National Forest officials said in a statement. Recreation sites and trails in that area will be closed through April next year.

Multiple U.S. Forest Service officials and vehicles were stationed at the Deschutes National Forest road closure on Thursday. A sign on the metal gate blocking the road said the temporary emergency closure will last at least one year.

Violators could face up six months in jail, fines up to $5,000, or both.

On Wednesday night, Mandy Bryant, who said she had lived in the encampment for about three years, was cleaning up her site and trying to get a trailer to start so she could move it.

“You could feel the heaviness in the air and just the stress and depression that people are feeling,” she told The Associated Press. “We’re up there on the list of groups of people that society doesn’t really care for.”

Four people living in the encampment including Bryant, along with two homeless advocates, filed for a restraining order to stop the closure earlier this month. The claim argued it would cause irreparable harm to more than 100 people who were living there, many of whom have disabilities.

The government responded in court filings that U.S. Forest Service staff in January began notifying homeless people living in the area of the upcoming closure. Original plans for the project were published in 2019 and were authorized by the U.S. Forest Service in 2023, the court filings said.

U.S. District Court Judge Michael McShane denied the restraining order on Tuesday and issued a written opinion on Thursday.

“The public’s significant interest in restoring natural habitats, preventing catastrophic wildfires, and preserving the overall health of Deschutes National Forest is not outweighed by the interest of 150 or so individuals in residing on this particular plot of land," he wrote in his ruling.

Webb, a Deschutes National Forest spokesperson, told The Oregonian/OregonLive that the government’s goal is “voluntary compliance,” but Forest Service officers and staff will patrol and “enforce the closure and ensure public safety.”

Rush reported from Portland, Oregon.