19 Jan 12 | Middle East and North Africa
Mouhamed Ali Ltifi, a journalist for Al-Oula, a new weekly newspaper, was assaulted and arrested by police officers on 18 January while he was taking the Tunis metro. According to a report on the newspaper’s official Facebook page, two of his colleagues witnessed the arrest.
Ltifi, who was released a few hours after his arrest, had been verbally and physically abused. Moez Zayoud, editor-in-chief of Al-Oula, told Index on Censorship in a phone call that Ltifi was “humiliated”.
“We have been harassed more than once”’, he said. “It’s not just us, but all independent and investigative media outlets face pressure.”
Zayoud said: “In the last weeks, pressure has increased over our newspaper.” In its 35th issue last week, Al-Oula published an investigation that accused the general director of the Tunisian Television institution of receiving huge amounts of money above his salary.
On 10 January, Al-Oula received a letter sent by the lawyer representing the general director warning the newspaper not to publish any personal details about his client.
17 Jan 12 | Middle East and North Africa
The fall of El Abidin Ben Ali has paved the way for the emergence of moral and religious censorship, despite opening the doors for freedom of speech and ending internet censorship.
Just like the left, the right have benefited from the fall of the wall of fear. They have organised themselves in political parties or organisations, stage protests to condemn cultural events they consider as “religious harassment,” and attempt to bring to justice those whose acts have “undermined Islam”.
Recently French weeklies Le Point and L’Express were kept from newsstands. The issue of L’Express contained representation of the Prophet, while the front page of Le Point included the headline “questions and answers on the existence of God”.
On 3 January, the Tunisian Press Company (Sotupresse), responsible for distribution of foreign magazines and newspapers in Tunisia, claimed in a press release that the editors of the two French weeklies decided to send the issues to Tunisia, and that Sotupresse did not distribute them “out of respect for the sacred values of Islam, and the Tunisian people.”
A number of upcoming legal cases will determine the extent to which such censorship threatens freedom of speech in post-revolt Tunisia. Two crucial tests are due before the courts; including a demand that the Tunisian Internet Agency (ATI) filter online pornographic content, and the trial of a TV station director for broadcasting the film Persepolis.
Following a complaint lodged by three lawyers demanding the filtering of pornographic content on the internet, a court in Tunis issued a verdict on 26 May of last year ordering the Tunisian Internet Agency to block access to pornographic websites. The ATI took the case to the Court of Appeal of Tunis, but lost the appeal on 15 August.
In early February, the ATI will appeal to the court of cassation ( the highest court of appeal) claiming that “the filtering of pornographic websites listed by Smart Filter could not be carried out for the five internet service providers”.
The lawyers demanding the filtering of porn claim that they are trying to protect children surfing the net. The Tunisian Internet Agency, desperate to break all ties with its old image as Internet censurer during the rule of Ben Ali, prefers to raise awareness of both netizens and parents by giving them practical tips on the use of parental control software, rather than censorship.
On 23 January, Nabil Karoui, director of Nessma TV, a private Tunisian channel, along with two of his employees will stand trial for airing the French-Iranian film Persepolis, a few weeks before last year’s election in October. Karoui, who risks three years in prison is accused of ‘’defaming Islam’’ and ‘’causing public disorder’’.
The broadcast of Persepolis, which includes a scene depicting god as a white-bearded man, sparked a wave of protests. The home of Karoui and headquarters of Nessma TV were also attacked. Depictions of god and religious figures are prohibited in Sunni Islam.
Reporters without Borders expressed concern about “the danger posed to media freedom in Tunisia by the increase in religious extremism’’, in an open letter to the new Tunisian government. The group said legal proceedings brought against Nessma “shows that Tunisia’s journalists and media need more than ever for the country’s authorities to defend freedom of expression and the right of its journalists to be able to work without being harassed”.
For free speech advocates, red lines such as moral and religious values can be used as pretexts to crash opponent voices, and pave the way for censorship’s return. Meanwhile, all eyes are on the legal proceedings of the Tunisian Internet Agency, and Nessma TV.
06 Jan 12 | Index Index, Middle East and North Africa, minipost
Two female journalists have been assaulted by police whilst covering protests in Tunisia. Sana Farhat of French-language daily Le Temps and Maha Ouelhezi from news website Web Manager Center were assaulted by plain clothed officers as they covered a demonstration by university teachers outside the ministry of higher education in Tunis yesterday. Farhat had her press card and camera seized, and was dragged along the ground by her hair after she demanded her equipment be returned. The video Farhat was making was wiped by officers. Ouelhezi’s camera was also seized and smashed by an officer.
29 Dec 11 | Uncategorized
It was pleasing to see a few names familiar to Index on Censorship as the Tunisian government took office over the weekend. People we defended and championed during the years of the former Ben Ali regime, and frequently featured in the magazine’s Index Index listings, turned up in a very different kind of list, one including Moncef Marzouki as new Tunisian president, the second most powerful role after the new prime minister Hamid Jebali.
Index chaired the Tunisia Monitoring Group of the IFEX free expression network (IFEX-TMG) between 2007 and 2011. I once had the pleasure of sharing a 2007 panel in Washington DC with Marzouki (recording here), convened in an attempt to get the US government and Congress to recognise the state of repression in Tunisia at the time. He dealt graciously with the Ben Ali drones specially flown in by the regime to try and discredit our arguments.
Marzouki, a doctor and established rights activist was jailed in 1994 after challenging Ben Ali in a presidential election. He was released four months later following an international campaign, but forced into exile. A brief return to Tunisia was marked by weeks when hundreds of plainclothes security service officers surrounded his home and office around the clock and followed him everywhere.
Two other names who were regular namechecks in Index Index have a particularly significant role in the new government. Mohammed Abbou, a member of Marzouki’s Congress for the Republic party, and now deputy prime minister for administrative reform, has the task of retraining, reenergising or just removing the old-regime party hacks still populating the old sclerotic civil service.
The new deputy prime minister for relations with the Constituent Assembly, Abderazek Kilani, has the equally important role of ensuring that the government — charged with drafting a new constitution for the country — remains answerable to the Assembly and it’s voice is heard. Kilani, an independent, is one of the country’s most active human rights activists, going back to his time as leader of Tunisia’s Young Lawyers in 1989.
Outside the government, another lawyer and another name from Index’s back issues, Judge Kalthoum Kennou is the new president of the Association of Tunisian Judges (AMT). She and 10 other brave and independent-minded judges elected to the MAT’s ruling council were the focus of a 2010 campaign by Index, the IFEX-TMG and Article 19 to support the independence of the judiciary.
Index’s work in the country, coordinating a major advocacy project in Tunisia that begun a year before Ben Ali’s removal, goes on. More details.
