Souab is a fierce critic of President Kais Saied and was arrested for feedback concerning the judiciary appearing beneath duress.
A Tunisian choose has ordered the detention of outstanding lawyer Ahmed Souab, a fierce critic of President Kais Saied, attorneys mentioned, two days after his arrest for feedback concerning the judiciary.
Souab’s arrest sparked widespread anger amongst political events and civil society teams, which mentioned the transfer was a harmful escalation of a crackdown on dissent and marked an additional entrenchment of the nation’s authoritarian regime.
Activists took to the streets in protest this week, calling for his launch, chanting slogans towards Saied and demanding an finish to the harassment, silencing and imprisonment of critics.
Souab was on the authorized defence group within the mass trial final week, through which dozens of defendants, together with vocal critics of Saied, had been handed jail phrases of as much as 66 years.
The lawyer was arrested on Monday in a police raid on his residence within the capital Tunis, after saying earlier than his purchasers’ sentencing that “knives aren’t on the necks of detainees, however on the neck of the choose issuing the ruling,” criticising political strain judges had been allegedly beneath.
An anti-terrorism courtroom interpreted the remark as a risk to the judges, however Souab’s attorneys mentioned it was a reference to the massive political strain on judges.
Activists and members of human rights teams maintain a banner which says: ‘No to distant trials, No to a judiciary that doesn’t assure rights, Freedom for political detainees’ as they protest in entrance of a Tunis courtroom (Jihed Abidellaoui/Reuters)
Souab had been detained on “terrorism-related prices” over the remark, a spokesperson for the courtroom mentioned.
Souab is a retired administrative choose and lawyer, and a vocal critic of Saied, who has repeatedly mentioned the judiciary had misplaced its independence.
His attorneys boycotted Wednesday’s listening to after the choose knowledgeable them that he had accepted the illustration of solely 4 attorneys out of the handfuls current to defend him.
Saeb Souab, the detained lawyer’s son, advised journalists that “primarily based on a metaphor, my father is now suspected of terrorism”.
Addressing President Saied, his former regulation professor Saeb Souab mentioned, “This isn’t the regulation you taught us.”
He referred to as for the discharge of his father, who he mentioned suffers from coronary heart issues.
‘Hasty trial’
Since Saied launched an influence seize in the summertime of 2021, rights advocates and opposition figures have decried a rollback of freedoms within the North African nation the place the 2011 Arab Spring started.
Critics have denounced the current mass trial as politically motivated and baseless. The defendants confronted prices together with “conspiracy towards state safety” and “belonging to a terrorist group”, in keeping with their attorneys.
Amongst these focused are figures from what was as soon as the most important get together, Ennahdha, such because the chief and former Speaker of Parliament Rached Ghannouchi, former Prime Minister Hichem Mechichi, former Minister of Justice Noureddine Bhiri, and Stated Ferjani, a member of the get together’s political govt.
However the crackdown has additionally Hit many many non-ennahdha figures, together with Abir Mousi, A fierce critic of ennahdha, and Abderazek krimi, the undertaking director of the tunisian refugee nation.
A few of them had been arrested in February 2023, after which Saied labelled them “terrorists”.
“The Tunisian courtroom didn’t give defendants a lot as a semblance of a good trial,” mentioned Bassam Khawaja, deputy Center East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch.
Tunisia was “making it clear that anybody collaborating in political opposition or civic activism dangers years in jail after a hasty trial with out due course of”, he added.
A number of Tunisian authorized students additionally denounced in a petition on Tuesday “flagrant violations of all of the bases of a good trial”.
