What the video shows

For more than three minutes, an unidentified man singles out Hamma Hammami by name, along with lawyers Samir Dilou, Mohamed Abbou and Ezzeddine Hazgui, and Rached Ghannouchi, the historic leader of the Ennahdha party. His tone leaves little room for ambiguity: the man repeatedly calls for Hamma Hammami’s execution, states he is personally prepared to carry it out, and describes a scenario in which those named would be rounded up and bound together. He also calls on the authorities to prevent some of them from leaving the country.

To justify his remarks, the man attributes to Hamma Hammami statements about a planned mobilization starting on July 25 — a date associated with the political process launched by President Kais Saied since 2021. That attribution could not be independently verified. Several Tunisian outlets, including Business News, chose not to broadcast the full video, limiting themselves to reporting its content for informational purposes.

A complaint, and a call from Paris

Given the severity of the remarks, Hamma Hammami announced he had filed a complaint with Tunisian authorities. His move quickly resonated beyond the country’s borders: Jean-Luc Mélenchon, founder of France’s La France Insoumise party, publicly voiced concern, describing Hamma Hammami as a comrade and a longtime advocate for democratic freedoms. He called for his security to be guaranteed and for those responsible for the threats to be punished, while stressing that such violence seemed foreign to what he described as his image of Tunisia, a country he called a friend.

The appeal was echoed by several supporters of the Workers’ Party, who are calling on the public prosecutor’s office to take up the case without delay, both to ensure effective protection for Hamma Hammami and to identify the video’s author. As of now, neither the prosecutor’s office nor the Interior Ministry has publicly commented on the state of the investigation or on any protective measures taken on the party leader’s behalf.

A climate of tension that extends beyond one man

What this affair reveals, above all, is the persistence of a climate of threats targeting political opponents, lawyers, human rights defenders and journalists in Tunisia. For several years, voices critical of the government have regularly reported online harassment campaigns, without their authors always being identified or prosecuted with the same rigor applied to other forms of expression. Opinion pieces devoid of any call to violence have, in the past, led to legal proceedings, feeding a sense among several human rights organizations that online content is treated unevenly depending on whether it supports or criticizes those in power.

A figure shaped by decades of repression

This is not Hamma Hammami’s first confrontation with the authorities. A former underground spokesman for the Tunisian Communist Workers’ Party under the rule of Ben Ali, he was arrested and imprisoned on several occasions and, according to accounts documented at the time, reportedly subjected to mistreatment in detention. After becoming secretary general of the Workers’ Party following the 2011 revolution, he established himself as one of the most consistent voices of the Tunisian left, including in his criticism of the new institutional framework put in place by Kais Saied since 2021.

Nor is this the first time Hamma Hammami has faced threats: similar episodes in the past earned him close protective security, which has since been scaled back. This latest warning thus comes against the backdrop of a Tunisian political climate still marked by sharp tensions between supporters and opponents of the process under way since 2021, one in which the question of freedom of expression continues to divide.

The investigation opened following Hamma Hammami’s complaint will now need to establish the identity of the video’s author. It remains to be seen whether the mobilization sparked by this affair, both within Tunisia and abroad, will help change how online threats against critical voices are handled by the country’s justice system.

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Four Years of Proceedings, a Verdict Reaffirmed

The story begins in 2022. On June 13 of that year, amid a broader judicial mobilization, Anas Hmaidi was accused of deliberately disrupting a preliminary hearing at the Monastir court of first instance. The context matters: weeks earlier, 57 judges had been dismissed by presidential decree, triggering outrage within the judiciary.

For the case to proceed, Hmaidi’s judicial immunity first had to be lifted. That happened on September 20, 2022, by decision of the Provisional Judicial Authority. The investigation moved forward from there, eventually leading to trial on charges of obstructing freedom of work under Article 136 of the Penal Code.

The first-instance verdict came on April 6, 2026: the sixth correctional chamber of the Tunis court of first instance sentenced Hmaidi to one year in prison. He appealed — but never appeared at the subsequent hearings, despite two postponements granted to his lawyers. By then, the judicial source noted, he had already left Tunisian territory.

A Defense That Fought to the End

His legal team did not hold back. Before the first-instance court, they had requested a trial postponement pending the outcome of an appeal against the lifting of Hmaidi’s immunity, as well as consideration of a Court of Cassation ruling on a request to relocate the case. Both requests were denied.

His lawyers also pointed to what they described as procedural flaws, particularly regarding fair trial guarantees and the union rights meant to protect magistrates organized within a professional association.

The Association of Tunisian Magistrates has consistently maintained that the proceedings were flawed from the start. The organization points to the case’s transfer between multiple courts, an investigation it says was rushed, and the fact that its president was never questioned before being referred to trial. More broadly, the AMT views the case as a form of retaliation against Hmaidi’s union activism and his advocacy for judicial independence — and has called from the outset for the charges to be dropped.

A Trial Rooted in a Deeper Crisis

To understand this case, one must go back to the rupture of 2022. The dismissal of 57 judges that year, officially justified as an anti-corruption measure, was widely seen within the judiciary as a heavy-handed move lacking sufficient safeguards. The response came swiftly: strikes, sit-ins, sustained mobilization led in large part by the AMT, an association founded in 2016 to defend judicial independence from political power.

This episode fits into a broader institutional realignment underway in Tunisia since 2021, which several human rights organizations describe as a gradual erosion of the separation of powers. Against this backdrop, legal proceedings targeting union, political, and media figures critical of the government have multiplied, fueling concerns over pluralism and judicial independence in the country.

The Court of Appeal’s ruling does not close off the legal avenues still available under the law. Whether Anas Hmaidi, now outside Tunisia, will pursue them remains an open question — as does what this ruling will ultimately mean for the standoff that has pitted part of Tunisia’s judiciary against the executive for the past four years.

The post Anas Hmaidi Sentenced: Tunisian Appeals Court Confirms One-Year Prison Term appeared first on Jdd Tunisie.

The Facts: Two Cases, One Cumulative Sentence

The court ruled simultaneously on two separate cases, both stemming from Bensedrine’s tenure at the helm of the TDC.

The first case centers on an arbitration settlement agreement concluded with businessman Slim Chiboub, former son-in-law of ousted president Ben Ali. The chamber found Bensedrine, former TDC member Khaled Krichi, and former State Property Minister Mabrouk Kourchid guilty of abuse of office to the detriment of public administration. Bensedrine and Krichi were each sentenced to five years in prison; Kourchid received six. Chiboub, charged as an accomplice, was handed a five-year sentence as well. The defendants were also ordered to jointly reimburse approximately 1.776 billion dinars.

The second case concerns the Franco-Tunisian Bank (Banque franco-tunisienne, BFT). Here, Bensedrine faced additional charges of forgery and use of forged documents, on top of the offenses shared with her co-defendants. She was sentenced to five years for the common charges and an additional fifteen years for the forgery counts alone — retained as the most serious offense under the principle of penalty absorption. A joint civil fine of approximately 16.9 million dinars was also imposed.

The arithmetic of these convictions — five years in the first case, twenty years in the second — brings Bensedrine’s total sentence to twenty-five years, to be served immediately.

A Trial Marred by Procedural Irregularities

Beyond the severity of the sentence, it is the fairness of the proceedings themselves that has drawn the sharpest criticism from national and international observers.

On June 18, 2026, during the first scheduled hearing, Bensedrine’s family members, journalists, and civil society representatives were physically barred from the courtroom. No official explanation was provided by the tribunal. This exclusion stands in direct contradiction to the guarantees of a fair trial enshrined in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights — ratified by Tunisia — which establishes the public nature of hearings as a fundamental right of the accused.

The International Commission of Jurists (ICJ), in a statement released the day before the verdict, urged Tunisian authorities to drop all charges against Bensedrine, describing them as “fabricated accusations” directly linked to her legitimate work leading the TDC. Civil society organizations have further invoked Article 96 of the 2013 Organic Law on Transitional Justice, which explicitly prohibits judicial proceedings against TDC members on the basis of the content of its final report — a provision the court apparently chose to disregard.

Bensedrine’s pretrial detention had itself raised serious legal questions. Placed in Manouba prison in August 2024 following an arrest warrant issued by an investigative judge at the economic and financial judicial unit, she launched a hunger strike on January 14, 2025, before being released on February 19 by order of the Court of Appeal, though remaining subject to a travel ban.

The Political and Economic Backdrop

This verdict cannot be understood in isolation from the political trajectory Tunisia has followed since July 25, 2021, when President Kaïs Saïed suspended parliament, consolidated executive and judicial powers in his own hands, and pushed through a constitutional overhaul that fundamentally restructured the country’s institutional framework.

Economically, Tunisia is navigating a prolonged structural crisis: sluggish growth, a chronic budget deficit, persistent inflation, and drawn-out negotiations with the International Monetary Fund that have yet to yield a comprehensive agreement. Against this backdrop of social fragility, the use of judicial proceedings against opposition figures and civil society leaders is widely interpreted by observers as a tool of political neutralization rather than a genuine pursuit of accountability.

The numbers are stark. Since July 2021, Human Rights Watch has documented the detention of more than eighty individuals — politicians, lawyers, journalists, and activists. In April 2025, thirty-seven opposition figures and human rights defenders had already been sentenced to terms ranging from four to sixty-six years on state security charges.

The TDC: The Unfinished Legacy of a Revolution

Established in December 2013 in the wake of the 2011 revolution, the Truth and Dignity Commission stood as one of the most ambitious transitional justice experiments in the Arab world. Mandated to investigate human rights violations committed since 1955, it received more than 62,000 complaints and referred 205 cases to specialized chambers, enabling prosecutions against former security officials, ministers, and businessmen connected to previous regimes.

To convict the woman who led that institution is, in the eyes of her defenders, to retroactively criminalize the very work of memory and reparation she embodied. The stakes of this case extend well beyond the fate of a seventy-five-year-old activist who has survived the prisons of Bourguiba, Ben Ali, and now faces sentencing under Saïed. What is ultimately on trial is the durability of a legal and moral legacy that post-revolutionary Tunisia built with great difficulty — and that the present authorities appear intent on dismantling.

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The Charges

According to a well-informed source, the charges brought against the four defendants include “exploitation of public office to obtain an unjustified benefit for oneself or others, causing harm to public administration, violation of applicable regulations, as well as fraud and use of fraudulent documents.” The charges fall squarely within the scope of criminal law governing corruption in the management of public assets.

The case originates from a complaint filed in December 2022 by an association dedicated to the protection of the archaeological and cultural heritage of Carthage. The association alleged the existence of corruption in the transfer of a land parcel in the Carthage area to a private individual at a price bearing no relation to the property’s real value, and without prior consultation with state property appraisers. Experts subsequently appointed by the court confirmed a significant gap between the price recorded in the sale deed and the actual market value of the property at the time of the transaction — a discrepancy that, according to the complaint, caused substantial financial damage to the municipality. A specialized security unit was tasked with enforcing the arrest warrants against the four defendants.

Two Cases, One Journalist

This is not the only legal battle Ziad El Hani is currently fighting. The journalist was previously convicted in a separate case under Article 86 of the Telecommunications Code, which criminalizes harm to others through public communication networks, after publishing an online post that referenced information related to a judicial case. He appealed the one-year prison sentence, and the Tunis Court of Appeal has scheduled a hearing for June 12, 2026.

Two distinct proceedings, two different legal frameworks — one rooted in the management of public property, the other in digital expression — are now running simultaneously against the same individual.

Context: Special Delegations and Article 86

The case against El Hani in the Carthage affair reflects a broader legal grey zone surrounding Tunisia’s special delegations — appointed bodies that replaced elected municipal councils following their dissolution after July 2021. Decisions made by these structures are increasingly being revisited through judicial channels, exposing their former members to retrospective legal liability, regardless of their professional background.

Article 86 of the Telecommunications Code, meanwhile, has been applied in a growing number of cases targeting journalists and online commentators in Tunisia. International press freedom organizations, including Reporters Without Borders (RSF) and the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), have repeatedly criticized the provision for its broad and loosely defined scope, calling for its revision or repeal.

With the June 12 appeals hearing in the first case just days away, and a new arrest warrant now added to the picture, the legal fate of Ziad El Hani remains suspended — pending judicial decisions that are still far from settled.

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On Thursday, May 21, 2026, the criminal chamber specializing in financial corruption cases handed down the sentence against Tabib, a former bar association president who once led the National Anti-Corruption Authority (INLUCC). He was found guilty of forging documents, possessing and using forged papers, and destroying records. A judicial source confirmed the ruling to the Tunis Afrique Presse (TAP) news agency.

Forged documents at the heart of the case

The case dates back to 2020, when Tunisia was mired in a deep political crisis. Tabib, then at the helm of INLUCC, submitted a file to the Assembly of the Representatives of the People alleging conflicts of interest against the then-head of government, Elyes Fakhfakh.

While the move appeared to be a routine institutional procedure, it triggered a cascade of legal consequences. The court ruled that several documents transmitted to Parliament had been falsified, thereby compromising the integrity of an official act from an independent oversight body.

Weeks after submitting the file, in August 2020, Fakhfakh dismissed Tabib from his post — a decision that sparked sharp controversy and fueled debates about the genuine autonomy of regulatory bodies vis-à-vis the executive branch.

A man with a unique institutional career

Tabib is no ordinary defendant. A respected lawyer and former president of the national bar association, he was appointed to lead INLUCC in the years following Tunisia’s 2011 revolution. His profile — at the intersection of law and civil society — made him a reference figure in the fight against corruption.

His conviction by the very court tasked with prosecuting financial corruption crimes presents a paradox that will not be lost on the Tunisian public.

He appeared at trial while at liberty, though an arrest warrant had been issued by an investigating judge from the economic and financial judicial division, following an inquiry based on a report from the Court of Auditors.

Anti-corruption fight: progress and contradictions

Since 2011, Tunisia has built an institutional and legislative arsenal meant to make transparency a national priority. INLUCC, created in the revolution’s aftermath, was designed to be its flagship institution. But the gap between ambition and on-the-ground realities has only widened.

Successive reports from Transparency International, as well as Tunisian civil society groups, have consistently pointed to persistent corrupt practices at various levels of the state and the economy. The fragility of oversight bodies, their exposure to political pressure, and a lack of resources have all been cited as barriers to an effective anti-corruption drive.

In this context, Tabib’s trial unfolds during a particularly intense judicial period. Since the political turning point of July 25, 2021, and the subsequent reconfiguration of power around the presidency, several cases involving former senior officials have accelerated noticeably — feeding an ongoing debate over the conditions for judicial independence in Tunisia.

Thursday’s ruling is not final. As a first-instance decision, it remains subject to appeal, leaving the door open for further legal developments. Yet beyond the procedure, a fundamental question now looms large: How does a democracy under construction ensure that its oversight institutions remain immune to the very abuses they are meant to combat?

Source: Tunis Afrique Presse (TAP), May 21, 2026

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Demands That Transcend Professional Grievances

On the surface, the Tunisian Order of Lawyers lists six grievances: judicial sector reform, improved working conditions, the restoration of the Supreme Council of Magistrates, modernization of court infrastructure, the sustainability of the lawyers’ pension fund, and an end to prosecutions targeting certain bar members. In reality, these demands point toward a more serious diagnosis: that of a judicial apparatus in disrepair, directed from the top by the state executive.

Boubaker Blathaout, the bar’s dean, articulated the underlying stakes during the first gathering: “We defend our right to freedom, we guarantee fair trials, and we demand that justice not be used as an instrument of political conflict.” This seemingly basic assertion carries outsized symbolic weight in the current Tunisian context. It signals that the legal profession has grown weary of functioning as a willing extra in a system where judicial robes too often conform to the wishes of those in power.

The lawyers’ placards conveyed the same message with cutting directness: “No to the dismissal of the bar’s demands. No to the denial of justice.” Other signs read: “No restriction of the right to defense,” and “Guarantees of fair trial must exist.” These are not the slogans of a professional association seeking mere salary increases. They are declarations about the nature of state power itself.

The Crux: A Supreme Council in Limbo Since 2022

The fixation on the Supreme Council of Magistrates is not coincidental. After President Kais Saied’s seizure of power in February 2022—which brought about the dissolution of this institution—lawyers expected a swift restoration of this constitutional safeguard. Yet four years later, the CSM remains quasi-nonexistent as a functioning body. This absence is not a matter of bureaucratic sluggishness; it reflects a deliberate intent to keep judges dependent on executive will.

Without this council, magistrates lack any meaningful protection against political pressure. Appointments, transfers, and dismissals now flow from administrative decisions made without institutional counterweight. Lawyers view this situation as symptomatic of a deeper pathology: the progressive instrumentalization of judicial power. Several attorneys have themselves faced criminal prosecutions for alleged financial corruption—charges they regard as retaliatory measures.

The question haunting the bar is uncomfortable but essential: In a state where the executive controls judicial outcomes, can there be justice? The international legal community has answered this question with mounting alarm. The International Commission of Jurists, Amnesty International, and MEDEL (the Mechanism for Cooperation among the Maghreb and West) have all issued reports documenting what they describe as a “grave erosion” of judicial independence in Tunisia.

Government Silence as a Form of Response

When confronted with this mobilization, the government has chosen indifference. Leïla Jaffel, Minister of Justice since October 2021, has consistently refused substantive dialogue with the bar association. The ministry went so far as to announce, even before the strike began, that courts would operate normally—a gesture of pure defiance. No offer of compromise. No opening to negotiation. Only refusal to listen.

This posture reveals something consequential: the executive views the judicial branch as its exclusive prerogative. By ignoring the bar’s demands, it sends a message to judges who might still harbor doubts about their subordination: independence is not a right but a revocable privilege.

A Judicial System Corroded by Institutional Breakdown

The lawyers’ strike does not emerge from nowhere. It responds to manifest deterioration across the judicial sector. International reports converge on a shared diagnosis: Tunisia’s judicial independence is undergoing systematic erosion.

The magistrates themselves have sounded alarms. The Tunisian Association of Judges has noted that the 2025-2026 judicial year marks the third consecutive year without institutional guarantees of independence. Rule-of-law violations accumulate: opposition politicians tried via videoconference on charges of “conspiracy against state security,” prolonged detention without procedural safeguards, a judicial system patently segmented along political lines.

Parallel to these political machinations, material conditions have deteriorated. Court clerks are understaffed. Buildings decay. Case delays stretch indefinitely. For lawyers—already accustomed to navigating a system grown hostile to robust defense—this combination breeds exhaustion. After years of unanswered requests for dialogue, patience has curdled into resistance.

The Contours of a Political Impasse

This strike exposes a fundamental contradiction at the heart of post-2022 Tunisia. The country adopted a constitution in 2014 whose Article 102 explicitly enshrines judicial independence. But once a president decides to exercise power differently, that independence becomes an inconvenient obstacle to be circumscribed or eliminated.

Lawyers striking today are not fighting for salary increases or shorter hours. They are fighting for the professional capacity itself—which is to say, fighting for the fundamental right of every person to competent legal defense. When the state renders the practice of defense impossible, it dismantles the foundations of rule of law.

The government, for its part, appears to be betting on attrition. It calculates that lawyers, facing lost income from the strike, will eventually accept the status quo. But this calculation overlooks a crucial social reality: no large-scale professional mobilization remains confined to its original grievances for long. It becomes symbolic, a crystallization of broader collective frustration. In a Tunisia already fatigued by political instability, the lawyers’ movement may well become a warning sign for growing swaths of the population.

The Critical Weeks Ahead

The timeline is compressed. Regional strikes will be staged through June 8th, followed by the national gathering on June 18th. If the bar achieves the level of mobilization it anticipates, courts could genuinely grind to a halt. No democracy has ever endured for long without a functioning judicial apparatus, however imperfect.

Two scenarios remain possible. In the first, the government makes partial concessions: it opens dialogue, accepts some reforms, restores the Supreme Council. This would require the executive to acknowledge limits to its power. In the second scenario, the strike persists, tensions escalate, and collateral damage mounts—hesitant investors, eroded public confidence, international legitimacy questioned.

Between these paths, the government has not yet chosen. Perhaps it has not yet grasped that the choice is urgent.

A Democracy at a Crossroads

The mobilization of Tunisia’s lawyers raises a broader question: Can a regime long prosper by evacuating its institutions of meaning? The answer Tunisia provides in the coming weeks will reveal much about its capacity to construct a durable rule of law—or its capitulation before that task

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At the heart of the dispute is the persistent inertia of the Ministry of Justice regarding trade union demands and repeated warnings about the deteriorating working conditions in Tunisian courts. A national press conference is also planned to inform the public of the situation in the country’s courthouses. Dean Boubaker Belthabet is signing the official statements on behalf of the council.

A precise strike schedule, a lasting anger

The decisions made on May 13, 2026, are not improvised. They are part of a gradual, carefully planned escalation by the National Bar Council, following what the profession describes as a deafening dialogue with the Ministry of Justice.

The action plan has two components. First, a series of mandatory regional strikes, spread over several weeks according to a precise geographical schedule:

Tuesday, May 19, 2026: Courts in Tunis, Nabeul, and Zaghouan are targeted, with a rally at the Tunis court of first instance.

Thursday, May 21, 2026: The bar associations of Bizerte, Béja, Jendouba, Le Kef, and Siliana will strike, with a rally at the Bizerte court of first instance.

Monday, May 25, 2026: Lawyers from Sfax, Gafsa, Tozeur, and Sidi Bouzid join the movement, gathering at the Sfax 1 court of first instance.

Monday, June 1, 2026: Médenine, Gabès, Kébili, and Tataouine follow, with a rally at the Médenine court of first instance.

Monday, June 8, 2026: The bar associations of Sousse, Monastir, Mahdia, Kairouan, and Kasserine close ranks around the Sousse court of first instance.

Second, a mandatory general national strike is scheduled for Thursday, June 18, 2026, with a central rally at the Tunis court of justice — the most symbolically charged date of the entire action program.

Starting May 18, all lawyers, without exception, are called upon to wear the red armband during their hearings in all courts of the Republic. This gesture — visible, sober, indisputable — is a form of silent protest intended for magistrates, litigants, and the public. The Tunis regional branch, under the signature of its president, Soufiane Ben El Haj Mohamed, released an official statement on May 14, 2026, to coordinate the practical details of the May 19 strike in the capital’s courts.

Specific demands, absent responses

To understand why the profession has reached this point, one must return to the roots of the conflict. The Bar Council recalls having repeatedly and officially requested a dialogue with the Ministry of Justice on a set of structural demands, spanning several fronts.

The first concerns the judicial infrastructure itself. The Bar Association denounces the advanced deterioration of court buildings: insufficient courtrooms, outdated equipment, and working conditions that no longer allow for a public justice service to be provided in dignified conditions. These situations directly affect the quality of procedures and, ultimately, the rights of litigants.

The second front concerns the institutional functioning of the judicial system. The Council points to the persistent deadlock in establishing the Supreme Judicial Council — a constitutional body whose absence affects the governance of the judiciary — as well as the use of what the profession describes as arbitrary circulars to organize the transfers of magistrates, without prior consultation or compensation for those affected.

The third issue concerns the social protection of lawyers themselves. Documented dysfunctions of the National Retirement and Social Welfare Fund for lawyers are a major concern for the entire profession, especially for generations approaching retirement.

Faced with these demands, the Ministry of Justice has reportedly not formulated any substantial response since the extraordinary general assembly of May 1, 2026 — a meeting described by the Bar Council as having brought together hundreds of lawyers from across the country, in a display of professional solidarity rare in its scale.

Historical reminder: a profession that has always resisted

The activism of the Tunisian Bar Association is not new. It is part of a long and well-documented tradition dating back to the first decades of the independent state.

As early as the 1960s and 1970s, under President Habib Bourguiba, Tunisian lawyers constituted one of the few professional bodies capable of organized resistance against the authoritarian excesses of the Destour regime. The National Bar Association, founded in 1956 following independence, quickly established itself as a counter-power space, protected by the nature of the legal profession and the formal independence guarantees attached to the practice of law.

In the 1980s, as Tunisia experienced a severe economic crisis and social tensions rose, lawyers played an active role in defending prosecuted trade unionists and political opponents, helping to maintain a minimal space for legal protection in a judicial system under pressure.

Under Ben Ali, the profession had an ambivalent relationship with the regime. Officially controlled, it nevertheless sheltered dissident voices, defended human rights activists, and produced figures who found themselves at the forefront of the post-2011 transition — including Chawki Tabib, a former bar president and former head of the National Anti-Corruption Authority, recently imprisoned in circumstances his supporters describe as politically motivated.

After the 2011 revolution, the Bar Association experienced an unprecedented period of ferment. Lawyers actively participated in drafting the founding texts of the new Republic, sat on national dialogue bodies, and contributed to the legislative framework of the democratic transition. The Bar also played a mediating role during the political crises of 2013, alongside the other components of the National Dialogue Quartet, which won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2015.

Since 2021, the profession finds itself in a new position: no longer a partner in a transition, but a sentinel watching for institutional regression with growing concern. The imprisonment of Chawki Tabib, the pressure on magistrates, the deterioration of working conditions in the courts — all signals the Bar interprets as an attack on the very foundations of the rule of law.

A tipping point ahead

The action program adopted on May 13 runs until June 18, 2026. Until then, every hearing in every court in the country will be marked by the lawyers’ red armband of protest. If the regional strikes do not produce a response from the ministry, the national strike on June 18 promises to be a breaking point.

The Bar Council has warned it will not stop there: the determination to “pursue all forms of struggle” is written in black and white in the statement signed by Dean Belthabet. What the government chooses to do — or not do — in the coming weeks will say much about the real state of dialogue between the executive branch and intermediary bodies in Tunisia.

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A Sentence Confirmed, A Message Delivered

The appeal ruling left nothing to chance. Every element of the original judgment — handed down on January 22, 2025, by the Tunis Court of First Instance — was confirmed in full. That means not only the prison term, but the entire financial architecture of the punishment: heavy monetary fines, the confiscation of the journalists’ personal assets, and the seizure of their shareholdings in companies they were associated with, all transferred to the Tunisian public treasury.

That last element deserves particular attention. By stripping Bessaies and Zghidi of their economic footing, the ruling does not merely punish them for the present — it forecloses the possibility of any meaningful professional recovery once they eventually leave prison. Their tools, their resources, their financial independence: all gone, by judicial order.

At the time the appeal ruling was delivered, both men had already spent nearly a year in pretrial and post-conviction detention since their arrest in May 2024. Under Tunisian law, that time counts against their total sentence — but it also means that, barring a successful cassation appeal, they face well over two more years of incarceration.

Financial Charges, Journalistic Targets

The nature of the charges against Bessaies and Zghidi has never stopped raising questions. Money laundering. Tax offenses. These are the instruments of commercial fraud prosecutions, the legal vocabulary of financial crime — not, ordinarily, the charges brought against journalists for their editorial work.

That distinction is not merely semantic. By framing the case in financial rather than press-related terms, prosecutors sidestepped the specific legal protections that Tunisian law formally extends to journalists. Decree-Law No. 115 of 2011, one of the foundational texts of post-revolutionary Tunisian press freedom, offers guarantees that simply do not apply when the charges are fiscal rather than journalistic. The outcome — two journalists imprisoned, silenced, and professionally ruined — is identical to what a press-related conviction would have produced. The legal pathway chosen to get there, however, was carefully different.

This is precisely what press freedom organizations have argued since the two men were first detained. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) and other international watchdogs have consistently listed Bessaies and Zghidi among the world’s imprisoned journalists, pushing back against any reading of their case as a straightforward financial matter with no bearing on media freedom.

Two Journalists, One Vanishing Space

Borhane Bessaies and Mourad Zghidi are not marginal figures. Both men built their reputations in the media environment that emerged after the 2011 revolution — a period when Tunisia, alone in the Arab world, seemed to be constructing something durable: a free press, a pluralist public sphere, an independent judiciary. Their work circulated in the critical, digitally-driven spaces that had no equivalent under Ben Ali.

That environment still exists, technically. But it has been contracting, steadily and visibly, since President Kaïs Saïed’s consolidation of power following his July 2021 power grab. The tools being used against journalists have multiplied and diversified. Article 86 of the Telecommunications Code — originally designed to regulate electronic communications infrastructure — has become a recurring instrument for prosecuting journalists and ordinary citizens who voice criticism online. As recently as late April 2026, journalist Zied Heni was placed in police custody under that provision after commenting on a judicial decision on social media.

Meanwhile, investigative outlet Inkyfada — one of the few Tunisian media organizations with a genuine track record of in-depth reporting — has been reported as facing threats of administrative dissolution. The High Independent Authority for Audiovisual Communication (HAICA), the regulatory body created after 2011 to safeguard broadcast pluralism, has seen its authority progressively undermined.

Against this backdrop, the Bessaies and Zghidi case stands apart in one critical respect: with sentences of three and a half years now confirmed on appeal, they are the most heavily punished journalists currently detained in Tunisia. Their case has become a reference point — the outer edge of what the current system is prepared to do to those who occupy the media space in ways it finds inconvenient.

What Comes Next

A cassation appeal remains theoretically available to both men. Unlike an ordinary appeal, cassation does not revisit the facts of the case; it examines whether the law was correctly applied and whether procedural guarantees were respected throughout the trial. Their legal team had not publicly announced, at the time of writing, whether they intend to pursue that route.

What is certain is that their case will not disappear from view. International press freedom organizations will continue to monitor it. Diplomatic missions in Tunis that have expressed concern over Tunisia’s democratic trajectory will note the verdict. And inside Tunisia itself, journalists who have watched this case unfold over more than a year will draw their own conclusions about what it means to practice independent journalism in the country today.

Tunisia was once the singular success story of the Arab Spring — the one place where a popular uprising seemed to have produced lasting democratic change. That narrative has been under strain for several years now. The appeal court ruling against Bessaies and Zghidi will not, by itself, define what Tunisia ultimately becomes. But in the long record of how this period is eventually judged, it will be one of the entries that historians find hardest to set aside.

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Heni was ‌detained last month after writing an article criticising the judiciary, a move ⁠the journalists’ ⁠union said was part of a broader crackdown on free ​speech.

Heni’s lawyer Nafaa Laaribi said that the ruling “is harsh, and it reinforces restrictions on free speech”.

Heni said on Wednesday in a letter from prison published by his family ​that he would not appeal any ruling.

“I’m facing an illegitimate trial in ⁠which my ⁠rights are being violated. ⁠I ​do not recognize any outcome resulting from it”, he added.

Rights groups warn of ​growing attempts to stifle ⁠remaining independent voices since President Kais Saied dissolved the elected parliament in 2021 and began ruling by decree.

In 2022, President Kais Saied also dissolved the Supreme Judicial Council and dismissed dozens of judges, a move the opposition said ⁠undermined judicial independence and turned it into a body receiving direct instructions.

Saied ⁠denies the accusations, saying he fought corruption in the judiciary and that the courts are now independent.

Free speech initially flourished following the 2011 uprising that toppled autocrat Zine El Abidine Ben Ali and led to the “Arab Spring”.

But critics say Saied’s accumulation of power in 2021 and decrees he has issued since then have dismantled democratic safeguards and enabled the authorities to pursue many journalists.

The leaders of Tunisia’s main ⁠opposition parties have been jailed in the last three years, along with dozens of politicians, journalists, activists and businessmen, on charges of conspiring against state security, money-laundering and corruption.

Saied says he will not be ​a dictator and that freedoms are guaranteed in Tunisia.

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The Law as an Instrument of Silencing

There is a cruel irony in the method. What characterizes the repression denounced by the UN is not, primarily, heavy-handed arrests or arbitrary closures. It is the law itself — or rather, its distorted use — that serves as the lever. Audits invoked at carefully chosen moments, administrative irregularities brandished as pretexts, decrees drafted in deliberately vague terms: a set of legal tools that make it possible to paralyze, without striking a visible blow, decades of civic and human rights work.

The suspension, on Tuesday, of Avocats Sans Frontières for a period of thirty days by a Tunisian court is the most recent illustration. The organization, whose teams work with the most vulnerable populations, found itself overnight unable to carry out any of its missions. A few days earlier, it was the Tunisian League for Human Rights that had suffered the same fate — an institution founded in 1977, a pioneer in the Arab world, brought to a standstill by a court ruling.

For Volker Türk, the pattern is now too consistent to be coincidental. “We are observing a growing trend in which Tunisian authorities are resorting to the use of judicially imposed sanctions to curb the exercise of the right to freedom of association, with the barest consideration for the principles of legality, necessity and proportionality required for such limitations to be permissible,” he stated.

Journalists Behind Bars for Doing Their Job

While civil society organizations navigate administrative courts, the independent press faces prison cells. On April 24, journalist Zied El Heni was arrested and placed in pre-trial detention. The charge: a penal provision criminalizing the use of telecommunication networks to “harm others” — a formulation so broad it can apply to virtually any form of critical reporting or commentary.

His case is part of a pattern that is far from incidental. The previous year, twenty-eight journalists — among them Mourad Zghidi — had been arrested, prosecuted and sentenced to various prison terms for acts directly related to the exercise of their profession. The primary legislative tool deployed against them is a 2022 decree-law officially dedicated to combating cybercrime, but whose broadly worded provisions allow authorities to pursue journalists for articles, interviews or public statements.

It is precisely this text that the UN is urging Tunisian lawmakers to revise. An amendment process is reportedly underway, but its outcome remains uncertain. Türk was unambiguous in his demand: “I urge the Tunisian authorities to release immediately and unconditionally all those detained or imprisoned for having expressed their views, protected under international human rights law, and to lift all arbitrary restrictions on the freedoms of expression and association.”

The Long Shadow of the 2021 Power Shift

To understand the trajectory that led to this situation, one must return to the summer of 2021. On July 25 of that year, President Kaïs Saïed suspended parliament, assumed sweeping executive powers and launched a constitutional overhaul that resulted, in 2022, in the adoption of a new foundational text concentrating authority overwhelmingly in the hands of the executive. This institutional power grab, described by its supporters as a “correction of the course,” was seen by opponents — and by much of the international community — as a clear break with the gains of the 2011 revolution.

For it is precisely that legacy which is now at stake. Tunisia had been, in the aftermath of the uprising that toppled Ben Ali, the only country of the Arab Spring to have successfully transitioned toward a pluralist system. A progressive constitution, free elections, a thriving civil society: achievements that earned the country, in 2015, the Nobel Peace Prize awarded to the National Dialogue Quartet.

Today, the UN also raises the alarm over the absence of a functioning constitutional court — an institution essential to ensuring that laws and decisions respect citizens’ fundamental rights. Without this safeguard, legal recourse remains limited and abuses difficult to contain. “Tunisia’s democratic and human rights gains after 2011 must be maintained, not progressively dismantled,” warned Volker Türk, in terms that sound less like a recommendation than a stark warning.

Behind the diplomatic language and official communiqués, a fundamental question now looms with growing urgency: how far is the international community willing to go to ensure that its warnings amount to something more than statements without consequence? And within Tunisia itself, what forces — political, legal, social — still hold enough weight to influence a trajectory that the UN, without equivocation, judges to be deeply troubling?

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