Last night, Saturday May 11, 2024, dozens of hooded security agents violently entered the premises of the "Maison des avocats" in Tunis. The raid set a serious precedent, unheard of even during the worst hours of past dictatorships.
They attacked the lawyers and journalists present. Their aim, apart from sowing fear, was to arrest the lawyer, Me Sonia Dahmani, who was being prosecuted for comments critical of the government, under the infamous decree-law 54. Dozens of Tunisians, journalists, bloggers and ordinary citizens who have denounced the authoritarian drift of power have been arrested in the name of this scurrilous decree. Many of them are serving long prison sentences, while others have been held for months awaiting trial...
Faced with this dangerous turn of events, which illustrates the increasingly repressive drift of President Kais Saied and his authoritarian regime, the Comité pour le Respect des Libertés et des Droits de l'Homme en Tunisie (CRLDHT) :
- Condemns this brutal intrusion and the verbal and physical attacks against lawyers and journalists;
- Demands the release of Maitre Sonia Dahmani, journalists Mourad Zeghidi and Borhane Bessaies and all those detained for expressing their opinions.
- Expresses its full support for the strike called by the Tunis regional section of the Ordre National des Avocats de Tunis on Monday May 13, 2024, and calls on all structures grouping lawyers to take a stand in defense of their members and the inviolability of their headquarters and structures;
- Calls on national and international human rights organizations and all democratic forces to unite against the regime's growing repression of independent voices and free opinion.
