Rescue effort underway after migrant boat sinks off Tunisia

At least 13 Tunisians are missing after a migrant boat sank off the Tunisian coast while sailing towards Italy and two people have been rescued, the head of a migrant rights group said on Saturday.

The boat, which set off early on Thursday, was carrying mostly young people, including seven members of the same family, as well as a man and his pregnant wife, Mostafa Abdelkebir, the head of the Tunisian Observatory for Human Rights, told Reuters.

The central Mediterranean route from the North African coast is one of the world's deadliest migration routes, used by migrants from Africa and the Middle East seeking to reach Europe, often in overcrowded or unseaworthy boats.

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 Abdelkebir, whose group monitors migration issues.

National Guard spokesperson Houssem Eddine Jebabli said coastguard units, backed by an aircraft and naval units, were conducting search operations for the missing migrants.

Abdelkebir said four bodies had been recovered, but it could not be confirmed whether they were migrants from the same boat.

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 and tighter maritime controls, backed by European funding and modern border-monitoring equipment, particularly from Italy.

Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and dozens of other human rights and humanitarian groups said in a statement last month that the EU-Tunisia migration deal had fuelled and normalised serious abuses against migrants and asylum seekers in Tunisia.

The groups called on the EU to suspend funding for migration and border-control activities involving Tunisian security forces.

Tunisia has not commented on the statement but has repeatedly said it is bearing the brunt of a major migration influx. President Kais Saied said in 2023 that the influx was aimed at changing the country's demographic makeup.