Last February, a Chinese student studying in Tunisia sent out a distress call after being bullied by passers-by who called him ‘corona’, in reference to the coronavirus originating in China, and threw stones at him.
Most people did not realize that the pandemic would spread so quickly to affect millions and kill thousands of people, including Tunisians.
As a result of the spread of the novel virus in Tunisia, bullying has moved to the local level, and there have been manifestations of exclusion that cannot be mistaken in the past period.
Residents in the regions of Bizerte and Beja prevented municipal authorities from burying two coronavirus victims in their cemeteries.
Security forces in the region of Bizerte (northern Tunisia) used tear gas to disperse a group of residents in the vicinity of the cemetery in the "Jalla" district to allow for health and municipal authorities to continue the process of burying the COVID-19 victim.
Jalal Qarira, a mayor in the Beja region, confirmed that the concerns of residents were unjustified given that all safety precautions were taken into consideration.
Local media played a part in aggravating the fears of residents, with some reports specifying that grave slots for COVID-19 victims must be three meters deep.
