A four-year-old girl who was separated from her parents as they tried to board a migrant boat from Tunisia to Italy was forced to make the journey across the Mediterranean Sea without them.
The girl, referred to as Linda by Italian authorities, disembarked on the island of Lampedusa on Oct. 17 after 26 hours at sea on a crowded wooden boat carrying a further 70 asylum seekers from Tunisia.
Authorities in Tunisia are attempting to repatriate her. Her parents have been given a travel ban and are accused of abandoning a minor.
Photo: AP
“Linda is doing well and she is in a community center for children in Palermo, after having been transferred from Lampedusa to a community in the province of Agrigento,” said Majdi Karbai, who is one of three Tunisian lawmakers who represent Tunisians living in Italy.
“She’s constantly asking about her parents and when she will be able to see them again,” Karbai said.
“Her parents are in Tunisia and Tunisian authorities [on Wednesday last week] imposed a travel ban on them. They would prefer to repatriate Linda, but the procedures are not so easy, as the girl is under the legal protection of a local guardian,” he said.
Karbai said Linda did not understand what was happening and had suffered an emotional shock.
The international non-governmental organization (NGO) Save the Children has provided support to Linda.
“She’s playing with other children and a psycho-social support team is helping her release her fears and pressure,” said Giovanna De Benedetto, a spokesperson for Save the Children. “We are taking care of her well-being.”
Linda and her family are originally from Sayada, a coastal city near Monastir, in the Sahel area, 162km south of Tunis.
Due to the current political crisis and food shortages in Tunisia, her father, a street vendor selling chapati and mlawi sandwiches in Sayada, has not been able to make a living and decided to leave Tunisia with his family.
Linda’s sister, who is seven, has a heart condition and needs constant health assistance. Her parents hoped in Europe the child could receive necessary care and before leaving had prepared a dossier containing her clinical records.
Migrant boats must be reached by sea and passengers must walk or swim to reach the vessels.
On Oct. 16, as Linda’s father held her in his arms, he suddenly heard his wife scream. The woman, who was accompanying their other daughter, had entered the water carrying some luggage and was afraid of drowning before reaching the vessel.
“At some point Linda’s father had to step back to support the rest of the family and so temporarily sat Linda on the boat,” said Karbai, who worked as a cultural mediator on Lampedusa in 2011 and learned the details from one of Linda’s family members after the boat left Tunisia.
“Meanwhile, the boat driver saw the big headlights of a truck and thought it was the police, so he started the engine and set off, leaving Linda’s family behind,” he said.
Linda’s parents have refused to talk to the media. They are accused of abandoning a minor and could be charged with human trafficking. They were released from jail after the news of the girl’s arrival on Lampedusa.
The Tunisian Ministry of Family, Women, Children and the Elderly said in a statement that discussions were under way with the Tunisian consular services in Palermo to repatriate the child, and that a Tunisian diplomatic delegation is expected to meet the judge of the juvenile court in Palermo.
On Friday last week, a Sicilian judge blocked the girl’s repatriation. Before making a final decision, the magistrate asked that a report be sent to Palermo on the causes of the accident and Linda’s departure without her parents.
The newly elected government in Rome led by far-right Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has promised the introduction of hardline measures to block the arrival of asylum seekers from North Africa.
North Africans are often considered “economic migrants” and are repatriated by European authorities who, despite the political instability and poverty in their countries, do not consider them deserving candidates for international protection.
EU immigration policies are pushing thousands of people to risk their lives to take more dangerous routes to reach Europe.
The bodies of two men and two women were recovered off Lampedusa on Monday. The four people had been missing since Sunday when a boat carrying about 30 people sank south of Sicily.
Meanwhile, two NGO rescue boats carrying hundreds of asylum seekers in the central Mediterranean are expected to face the first test of migration policy under Italy’s new government after Rome threatened to prevent them from entering Italian waters.
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