Tunisia’s Institute for Strategic Studies headed by foreign education minister Neji Jalloul announced a new political initiative that includes a cabinet ministerial reshuffle.  The initiative is said to bring together political parties and organizations under a collective project in the name of national sovereignty and construction for the year 2019. More so, it envisages the formation of a new government of 15 ministers, cutting off division of shares, a statement issued by the institute said. It will also put forward a proposal for merging several ministries into a single body that will hold equal accountability for operating tasks. The move is aimed at limiting the huge number of portfolios which has been a consistent character over successive governments since 2011. On the other hand, Tunisian Foreign Minister Khamis Al-Jahnawi confirmed on Friday that the establishment of zones by some European countries to round up unregistered immigrants in a number of southern Mediterranean countries has not been proposed toTunisia so far. Jahnawi said that Tunisia has on several occasions confirmed its opposition to the establishment of such zones. “The issue of migration cannot be tackled by rejecting the other, or by establishing zones for gathering immigrants. This issue requires all sides to come together to talk,” he said in a media statement following a meeting at the Foreign Ministrys headquarters with UN envoy to Libya Ghassan Salamé. “There are other ways to encourage legal migration, at a time when Europe needs demographic support from outside its borders,” said Jahnawi. On the other hand, in an initiative that is the first of its kind in the Arab world, Tunisian lawmakers began drafting a law for protecting refugees. It is expected to be approved by the cabinet soon before being referred to the parliament for adoption. The draft-law defines refugees based on the 1951 International Convention for the Protection of Refugees. It was prepared by the legal and judicial research center of the Tunisian justice ministry, which deals with all laws and draft-laws introduced by the government.