Tunisia returns migrant toddler who reached Italy alone

TUNIS: A four-year-old who reached Italy without her parents on a boat carrying migrants from Tunisia in October was repatriated on Thursday, authorities said.

Her return comes after a judge in Sicily ruled she should be sent home on a request by Tunisian authorities. The North African country´s families ministry, in a statement, said a Tunisian child protection delegate accompanied the girl on the trip home, “and handed her to her family upon arrival at Tunis-Carthage airport.”

The girl´s parents had planned to leave as a family along with her brother, aged seven, on a makeshift boat from the coastal town of Sayada and head towards the Italian island of Lampedusa, as increasing numbers of other Tunisians have done.