(New York) - The Tunisian government carried out a wide range of repressive measures against journalists and human rights defenders during 2009, an election year, with no improvement in basic freedoms, Human Rights Watch said today in its new World Report 2010.
The 612-page report, the organization's 20th annual review of human rights practices around the globe, summarizes major human rights issues in more than 90 nations and territories, including Tunisia and 14 other countries in the Middle East and North Africa. The report found that abusive governments intensified their repression of human rights defenders in 2009, a development that in part shows the growing effectiveness of the human rights movement.
"Tunisia's intolerance for human rights dissent makes it a prime example of a worldwide trend among repressive countries to cover up abuses by trying to silence the messenger," said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch.
The Tunisian government subjected human rights defenders and dissidents to heavy surveillance, arbitrary travel bans, dismissal from work, interruptions in phone service, physical assaults, harassment of relatives, and slander campaigns in the press. In Tunisia, authorities have refused legal recognition to any genuine independent human rights organization that has applied over the past decade. They then invoke the organization's "illegal" status to hamper its activities.
Press freedom is abridged in Tunisia and was increased during and after the national elections in October. None of the domestic print and broadcast media offer critical coverage of government policies, apart from a few low-circulation magazines. The government blocks access to some domestic and international political or human rights websites featuring critical coverage of Tunisia. The targeting of the press was particularly pronounced around the time of the presidential and legislative elections, which President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali and his ruling Democratic Constitutional Rally party won by a landslide for a fifth consecutive term. The election itself was marred by repressive acts and tight controls.
Despite campaign promises to increase press freedoms, Ben Ali stepped up a campaign against journalists who criticize the government. On the eve of the election, he said he would prosecute all those who tarnished Tunisia's image or who asserted without proof that the elections were fraudulent. Soon after the election, two independent journalists, Taoufik Ben Brik and Zouhair Makhlouf, were arrested and imprisoned on dubious charges in unfair trials.
Hundreds of men and some minors have been prosecuted under a 2003 law, in support of "International Efforts to Fight Terrorism and the Repression of Money Laundering." Nearly all of them have been convicted and imprisoned under this law on charges that they had planned to join jihadist groups abroad or had incited others to join, rather than of having planned or committed specific acts of violence.
Despite a 2009 amendment narrowing the law's definition of a terrorist act by restricting the definition of "incitement to hatred," suspects arrested under this law commonly face a range of procedural abuses. These include the failure by authorities to notify their families promptly, in violation of Tunisian law, extension of detention before the first hearing beyond the legal six-day limit, and the refusal of judges and prosecutors to act on requests for a medical examination.
Human Rights Watch recommends that the Tunisian government:
- Allow human rights groups and activists to operate freely and without impediment, including granting rights groups legal status.
- Respect freedom of the press, including freeing Taoufik Ben Brik and Zouhair Makhlouf, both imprisoned unjustly in reprisal for their critical reporting, and allowing access to websites that are blocked due to their political content.
