Tunisia: Arab lawmakers urge release of detained Saied opponents

Nearly 200 lawmakers from 19 Arab and Muslim-majority countries have urged authorities in Tunisia to release MPs arrested by President Kais Saied's government, including Ennahdha leader and former parliament speaker Rached Ghannouchi.

Their statement, released on Saturday through the International Islamic Forum of Parliamentarians, said the lawmakers’ arrests were "undermining freedom" and "threatening the most important pillars of democracy" in Tunisia.

Tunisia was widely perceived as the last bastion of the Arab Spring, with a functioning democracy existing in the country from 2011 until President Saied suspended parliament in a 2021 power grab. 

The 181 signatories said that the recent arrests perpetuated a "state of frustration and despair among the Tunisian population, who have always fought for freedom, social justice and dignity".

181 نائبا برلمانيا من مختلف الدول العربية والإسلامية(19دولة)يوقعون على بيان المنتدى الإسلامي العالمي للبرلمانيين يعربون فيه عن تضامنهم الكامل مع زملائهم المعتقلين البرلمانيين في تونس، وينددون بالظلم الواقع عليهم، ويطالبون النظام التونسي بضرورة الإفراج عنهمhttps://t.co/haPPbCscWt pic.twitter.com/Xe29xhR59S

— iifp (@iifp3) June 25, 2023

The parliamentarians said that Tunisia had seen "a setback in human rights", drawing attention to the recent arrest of former parliament speaker Ghannouchi.

Other opposition lawmakers detained include Ghazi Chaouachi, Ali Laarayedh and Sahbi Atig, who has gone on hunger strike over their imprisonment.

President Kais Saied's administration has increased arrests of opposition politicians and critics of the government since the beginning of 2023.

Many of those detained have faced charges such as "conspiring against the state", "terrorism", "money laundering" and "giving false testimonies".

Last month, Ghannouchi was sentenced to a year in prison on terror-related charges. His Ennahda party condemned the verdict as "unjust". 

It is not only politicians who have been arrested. Many media professionals, activists and businessmen have also been detained, the most prominent one being Noureddine Boutar, director of the privately-owned radio station  Mosaique FM.

Earlier this month, leading opposition member Ahmed Nejib Chebbi lambasted Saied for the wave of  arrests, saying that the president is "seeking to criminalise" the opposition.

Chebbi, a veteran politician who leads the National Salvation Front, was also called in for questioning over allegations of "plotting against state security".

The global human rights group Amnesty International voiced concern over the crackdown last month, accusing Saied's government of increasingly using vaguely-worded laws as a pretext for repression.

Last year, President Saied enacted a new constitution which has been condemned as "authoritarian" by rights groups, granting himself near-unlimited control over the country.

Saied has been accused of taking Tunisia back to the type of authoritarian rule which existed before 2011 under former President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.

Ben Ali came to power in Tunisia in 1987 and fled the country in 2011 following the outbreak of protests considered to have marked the beginning of the Arab Spring uprisings across the Middle East and North Africa.