On Friday, a Tunisian rights group revealed it had located 28 migrants and asylum seekers who had been abandoned without food or water near the Tunisian-Algerian border.
The group, FTDES, described the situation as catastrophic.
Among those assisted were seven women, three of whom were pregnant, and two children.
They were part of a group of 42 people reported as displaced and left in dire conditions in the desert border area.
FTDES spokesman Romdhane Ben Amor mentioned that the remaining individuals appeared to be hiding due to fear of police intervention.
They had been reportedly expelled from Sfax and transported to Gafsa.
On Thursday, it was reported that these migrants had been moved from Sfax, Tunisia’s main port for departures to Italy, to Gafsa, a governorate bordering Algeria in southwestern Tunisia.
Ben Amor noted that the 28 were rescued with the aid of local authorities and the National Guard and were subsequently moved to a shelter run by the International Organization for Migration (IOM).
Most of the rescued were from Sierra Leone, with others from Liberia and Nigeria.
