For access to the report: Freedom Struggles and Repression eng
For access to the database (AR)
Tunisia, June 19, 2023
Today, Intersection Association for Rights and Freedoms issued a monitoring report entitled “Clashes between Freedom and Repression.” The report monitors the political arrests that took place in 2023 in the period from February to the end of May.
Tunisia witnessed a wide campaign of arrests during that period, targeting politicians, businessmen, and journalists from different backgrounds who share opposition to the July 25, 2021 path, and opposition to the decisions taken by President Kais Saied and his government. These arrests took place based on judicial authorizations from the Public Prosecution in various cases, the most important of which is what is called the conspiracy case, in which the number of defendants is still undefined. Eight leaders of political parties and coalitions were issued prison remand warrants. In addition to the investigation of a number of businessmen and other figures in the same case. In which the defendants are spending more than 4 months in prison without trial. In a clear violation of their right to a fair trial.
The report refers to the number of arrests that took on a political nature, which targeted in most cases opponents of the ruling regime. Intersection Association for Rights and Freedoms monitored 37 cases in the period from February to the end of May 2023. The arrests were classified by gender to include 2 females against 35 males. The report also showed that the largest proportion of arrests was in February, as Intersection Association monitored 25 cases of arrest, while the remaining arrests were 6 in March and 6 other cases in April, compared to 0 cases in May. The report also referred to the number of days in prison, where it was found that 27 cases out of 37 had spent more than 100 days in prison.
The report aims to reveal the violations committed by the Tunisian state against the people who were arrested in arbitrary ways, and tried them by following procedures that violate the principles of a fair trial. Then it exposes a number of arrests in other cases, and the report targets the violations that the Tunisian state has committed against the detainees. And its manipulation of the judicial and prison system in order to take revenge on its political opponents.
The report ends by referring to the nature of these arrests, which were dominated by a lot of ambiguity and lack of clarity and their relationship to the current Tunisian political context, in addition to denouncing the procrastination in the judicial procedures and the lack of the lowest elements of a fair trial in these cases, where most of the detainees in them exceeded the period of four 4 months without having a trial in accordance with the law.
For access to the report: Freedom Struggles and Repression eng
For access to the database (AR)