11 Apr. (EUROPE PRESS) –
The NGO Human Rights Watch has asked the Tunisian authorities on Tuesday to release former Prime Minister Ali Larayed, a senior official of the Islamist party Ennahda, who is accused of allegedly sending jihadists to Syria.
“According to the information available, the prosecution of Larayed appears to be another example of how President (Kais) Saied’s authorities are trying to silence the leaders of the Ennahda party and other opposition parties by branding them as terrorists,” said Salsabil, director of HRW in Tunis. Chellali.
“The authorities must immediately release Larayed and other critical and political figures they are holding in the absence of credible evidence of the crimes,” Chellali said.
In this sense, he has denounced that “the authorities are presenting false charges of terrorism before a subjugated judiciary to discredit opponents and put them behind bars.”
The NGO has denounced that the arrest of the 68-year-old opposition politician is part of a broad police investigation into how thousands of Tunisians were able to leave the country and join the Islamic State and other armed groups, and that it has occurred in the midst of the intensification of repression against opponents.
In addition, the judge has accused Larayed of “not treating (the Islamist armed group) Ansar al Sharia as a terrorist organization”, despite the fact that his cabinet prohibited it in August 2013. The magistrate has also indicated that the then prime minister allowed “Muslim preachers who are well known for their extremism… to enter the territory” despite bans against them.
Ennahda leaders have been a key target of the authorities since Saied granted himself extraordinary powers, the organization denounces, noting that several members of the party have been subjected to arbitrary arrests and travel bans.
