Customs officer, Ras Jdir border crossing. Image credit: Abdel Aziz Hali
Escalating violence across Libya has driven thousands to the country’s shared border with Tunisia. At the Ras Jdir border crossing, refugees from Libya, Egypt, Jordan, and elsewhere have been forced to wait for approval to enter Tunisia. Under such circumstances, hundreds of refugees engaged in several attempts to storm the checkpoints en masse over the weekend. Although these attempts were repelled, they resulted in several deaths and the wounding of a Tunisian police chief who was shot in the leg from Libyan soil. These events led Tunisian authorities to order a number of temporary border closures.
Tunisia Live asked security, human rights, and economic experts for their thoughts on how such closures may impact Tunisia and the border region.
Mazen Cherif, security analyst at the Tunisian Center for Global Security Studies
The government must have a mechanism in place to assess the impact of border closures before it makes any decision.
[It] has to find the proper balance between supporting its neighbor and preventing chaos from affecting Tunisia’s stability. Tunisia should help Libya, as the two countries enjoy a longstanding, diplomatic relationship.
Regarding security, closing the border would not be a solution to the [current] crisis. It would engender other problems. It’s not as easy as simply closing the border. Terrorism existed in Tunisia long before the Libyan situation worsened. [... If the borders are sealed,] terrorist groups would enter Tunisia by other means. They may cross the Sahara Desert, for example. Groups such as Ansar al-Sharia and al-Qaeda [already] organize beyond the existing borders separating [Tunisia, Libya, and Algeria].
While such organizations have already developed their own “geostrategies,” Moncef Marzouki’s government lacks one of its own.
Amna Guellali, office director at Human Rights Watch Tunisia
We are concerned as to what closing the Tunisian-Libyan border would mean for human rights.
The situation is tragic. As Egypt and Algeria have already closed their borders with Libya, and as flights between Libyan cities and the rest of the world have been temporarily grounded, the land route between Libya and Tunisia is all that remains for refugees.
The closing could have terrible consequences for the people fleeing the conflict and could result in a humanitarian catastrophe.
It is very likely that weapons and fighters will pass through the border by taking advantage of the population flow. This legitimates the Tunisian government’s fears; however, such security concerns do not justify closing the border.
There are other alternatives, such as enhancing controls at crossings by increasing the number of guards and intensifying inspections of people and vehicles as they pass through checkpoints. Identity controls should also be strengthened so that refugees’ final destinations are known.
Karim Trabelsi, economist and specialist in informal economies
Nearly all economic transactions between Tunisia and Libya take place in the informal economy. This includes tobacco and fuel. Considering that roughly 1,000,000 Tunisians make their living from this trade, closing the border would harm their living conditions.
Twenty-six percent of Tunisia’s energy consumption comes from informally-imported fuels from its neighbors. Since fuel in Tunisia is subsidised, the informal economy allows the state to save whatever it would otherwise have spent on additional subsidies. These savings represent nearly 1,000,000,000 dinars (582,920,480 USD) each year for Tunisia’s economy.
While sealing the border could harm Tunisian exports to Libya, there would also be some positive aspects, economically speaking. Some of Tunisia’s subsidised food products are informally exported to Libya. Such is the case for bread, pasta, and cereals. If the border is closed, then the leakage of these subsidies could be contained.
The post Ask the Experts: Implications of Tunisia-Libya Border Closures appeared first on Tunisia Live.