A member of the European Parliament has accused the EU of complicity in human trafficking, torture, and other abuses occurring at the border between Tunisia and Libya where Tunisian authorities—funded by the EU to curb illegal migration— allegedly sell captured migrants to Libyan state and non-state actors, who then demand ransom from the victims' families.
MEP Ilaria Salis from Italy made these accusations after reviewing a report compiled by a group of European sociologists and anthropologists operating under the name Researchers X. The group members insist on remaining anonymous.Â
On Tuesday, the voice of a man who introduced himself as one of the researchers outlined the logistical stages of the expulsion process to the parliamentarians.
Migrants are reportedly captured by Tunisian authorities in various locations—including at sea, in workplaces, and within prison grounds—before being transported to the Libyan border, where they are detained and sold to Libyan armed forces and militias. Their only chance to be released is if ransom is paid by their families.
The report accused the EU of complicity in these expulsions and of perpetuating human rights violations by granting Tunisia “safe country” status. This designation allows Tunisia to manage the EU’s external borders in exchange for funding.
The agreement with Tunisia is one of several similar deals the EU has signed with African countries. Under the deal, signed in late 2023, Tunisia received 127 million euros ($132.25 million) to help curb immigration flows.
“Through the political strategy of externalizing borders in Libya and Tunisia—funded by all of us as taxpayers—Italy, other European countries, and the EU itself are complicit in the atrocities unfolding in these places. This includes complicity in human trafficking, enabled with the involvement of the Tunisian authorities,” MP Salis said.
The Researchers X report includes testimonies from 30 migrants from sub-Saharan Africa who were expelled to Libya between June 2023 and November 2024. During this period, Tunisian police and military forces allegedly carried out expulsion and trafficking operations at the Tunisian-Libyan border, where groups of migrants were sold in exchange for money, hashish, and fuel.
“At the border between Libya and Tunisia, we passed through seven military bases. In each one, we were beaten, searched, and tortured like slaves, like animals,” one man, identified only as a 25-year-old Cameroonian, recounted.
The Tunisian soldiers took their phones and stole their money, he said. Upon arrival at one base, two people were already dead, and his group was forced to load their bodies onto vehicles that took them away.
His group was then taken across the border into Libya, where Libyan soldiers were waiting to buy them.
“When you arrive, they split you into groups of ten. The intermediaries and the Libyans buy you—they pay the Tunisians right in front of you,” the man recalled. “I don’t know if the [Tunisian] president is aware of this, but it’s real.”
Women cost more, he said, because they are “used as sexual objects.”
In each exchange, groups of between 40 and 150 people were sold at prices ranging from 12 euros to 90 euros ($12.49 to $93.71) per person, with women sold at the higher end. According to the report, the price of each trafficked migrant was “based on the final value they could generate through ransom, the overall size of the group, and its composition.”
The researchers labeled these operations as “state crimes” and documented multiple human rights violations against the migrants, including arbitrary detention, racial discrimination, collective expulsion, enslavement, and enforced disappearance.
The 30 testimonies included accounts from people of different legal statuses in Tunisia—students, workers with residence permits, individuals with Tunisian passports and entry stamps, people with documents issued by the UNHCR, and undocumented individuals.Â
However, there was one common factor in all the arrests: all targets were Black migrants.
Uniformed personnel reportedly used various forms of violence against transferred migrants throughout the process, including sexual harassment and “the use of psychopharmacological drugs mixed with food to deter physical resistance,” according to one witness.
Once handed over to the Libyan side, migrants were detained in Libyan prisons, where they were sorted according to their ability to pay ransoms. The ransom demands ranged from 1,000 euros ($1,041) for immediate release to 400–700 euros ($416.49–$728.94) for those unable to pay immediately. Migrants were then further categorized by nationality and skin color.
However, paying the ransom did not guarantee release. Migrants could be forced to pay in one prison, only to be transferred to another where they would have to pay again, a witness told the researchers.
MP Isabel Serra Sanchez of Spain called Frontex - the agency financed by the EU that manages the European border - “a criminal organization” funding human rights violations.Â
By Thursday, neither the Tunisian government nor Frontex had replied to OCCRP’s requests for comment.
