Mohamed Abbou

New York, March 22, 2010—The Committee to Protect Journalists calls on Tunisian authorities to end the persecution and imprisonment of a critical journalist and to overturn a four-year jail sentence of another.

On Saturday, Tunis airport customs officials confiscated two copies of CPJ’s annual report, Attacks on the Press, as well as five copies of the Arabic-language translation of the Middle East and North Africa section of the book from Tunisian rights lawyer Mohamed Abbou and journalist Lotfi Hidouri on their return from Morocco, the two men told CPJ. 

“When people want to live, destiny must surely respond. Darknesss will disappear, chains will certainly break!”

Journalist Taoufik Ben Brik, 49, spurred admiration among his relatives and lawyers at a Tunis appeals court on Saturday when he chanted these two verses by Abou El Kacem Chebbi, Tunisia's most well-known poet. This unexpected recitation of Chebbi's verses, which galvanized resistance to French occupation and autocratic rule after the country's independence in 1956, followed the persecuted journalist’s first remarks in court about his ordeal since his incarceration on October 29. It was the first time he had been allowed to speak at his own hearing.

New York, January 20, 2010—An appeals court in the city of Nabeul refused today to release Tunisian Zuhair Makhlouf despite his completion of a three-month prison term imposed in October. The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the court’s decision and demands authorities release Makhlouf immediately.

New York, September 24, 2009—The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns a Tunisian government-backed smear campaign against the Qatar-based Al-Jazeera satellite television station. The campaign has had a negative impact on freedom of expression in Tunisia.

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