“I regret the day I threw a rock at a police officer,” says a resident of Mellassine. 13 years after the revolution, public resentment toward the police is no less palpable in a neighborhood rife with drug trafficking, crime and misery. For many young men and women here, the only apparent escape route from their daily struggle is one heading overseas.
من حدث رياضي إلى آخر، يتواصل العنف داخل الملاعب والقاعات مخلفا أضرارا جسيمة تطال الحضور والمنشآت الرياضية. بيانات رسمية ووزراء يلتقطون الصور محملين المسؤولية للجماهير وحدها فيما حصل.
تتواصل وتيرة العنف البوليسي وموجة القمع لمختلف التعبيرات الاحتجاجية، عبر الاعتداءات اللفظية والماديّة المؤدية أحيانا للوفاة. نستعرض فيما يلي أبرز الاعتداءات التي ارتكبتها الشرطة في الأشهر الأخيرة.
بنوع من الصدمة والخجل، استفاق الرأي العام في البلاد على حقائق ممارسات إحدى النقابات البوليسية بعد سنوات من الإنكار والهروب من الحقيقة. إنكار تورطت فيه مؤسسات الدولة ووزارة الداخلية التي دأبت على لملمة جرائم منظوريها ومهاجمة كل من تسوّل له نفسه فضح ممارسات النقابات المسلحة.
تظاهر مئات التونسيين بالعاصمة قرب شارع الحبيب بورقيبة بعد دعوات الأحزاب للتظاهر في ذكرى 14 جانفي .قوات الأمن أغلقت كل المنافذ المؤدية للشارع التاريخي وأقامت حواجز أمنية في كل مكان .اندلعت مواجهات بين المتظاهرين وقوات الأمن التي استعملت الغاز وخراطيم المياه والماتراك لتفريق المحتجين .وقد تم إيقاف عشرات المتظاهرين وتعرض عدد من الصحفيين والمصورين إلى اعتداءات بالعنف وافتكاك معدات عملهم.
Over several days in late November 2012, police used birdshot against protesters in Siliana, injuring hundreds of people including demonstrators, journalists covering the demonstration, and bystanders, according to an Amnesty International report at the time. One investigative report by civil society put the number of injured at 178, and at least 20 people lost eyes or sustained severe damage to their eyes. Now, a decade later, these people are still calling on authorities to cover their healthcare costs, extend their social benefits, and hold the officials responsible for the use of birdshot accountable.
In recent years, there has been increasing tension around the use of haphazard landfills as residents nearby these toxic sites protest the serious short and long-term hazards they face.
Plus de 1500 personnes dont environ 500 mineurs ont été arrêtées depuis janvier 2021, en marge des mouvements de protestation contre le système politique et économique en place. Hormis les arrestations arbitraires, les téléphones des manifestants ont été confisqués et leurs données violées par les agents de police.
“There is no government, there is no state, we are the state”. These chilling words by a police officer, during a sit-in in the city of Sfax on 2 February, speak volumes about the dangerous turn of events in Tunisia in recent weeks. The latest unrest heightens risks of a return to a police state following years of shaky democratic transition which has failed to end abuses by security services and their rampant impunity for human rights violations.
After more than a week of protests across the nation following a sudden, government-imposed lockdown on the 10th anniversary of the January 14, 2011 revolution, security forces have arrested over 1600 people, 600 of them children, according to Yassine Azaza, a human rights activist and volunteer lawyer on behalf of the Tunisian League of Human Rights (LTDH by its French acronym). Those numbers were given to Nawaat/Meshkal on January 20, 2021, but since then the numbers have increased and human rights activists and organizations said they are struggling to keep track.
On October 6, lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) activists in Tunisia raised their voices and banners in the street, amid the hundreds of demonstrators who were peacefully protesting a draft law that would drastically limit criminal accountability for the use of force by the security forces. By a cruel irony, police attacked the demonstrators, including LGBT activists, and arbitrarily arrested them.
On Tuesday, October 6, demonstrators gathered in front of Parliament to protest a draft law under discussion seeking to grant security forces legal immunity from prosecution for use of force—the first of several protests against the law this week. Police forces then assaulted protesters and detained four of them at a police station in the Bardo neighborhood. Meshkal/Nawaat spoke with the four people who were detained and later released about the police abuse they experienced.
Numerous are the reports of arbitrary law enforcement and abuse of power since the confinement was first imposed in Tunisia. Certain members of security forces have used unwarranted verbal and physical violence against citizens. Not even activists collecting medication for hospitals have been spared this harassment.
In November, Lawyers Without Borders (ASF) and the Tunisian Bar Association (ONAT) launched a campaign to speed up the implementation of legislation intended to protect the rights of detainees. It has been almost two years since parliament voted to reform Tunisia’s penal code through the adoption of Law n°5-2016, known more simply as Law 5. And yet statistics and testimonies indicate that misconduct by officials and human rights abuses committed in police stations and detention centers remain commonplace. What will it take for old practices to be replaced by the procedures set out in the new legislation?
On November 15, after nearly two weeks of fervent critique and promises of public demonstration, the Interior Ministry stepped in to stay a polarized debate around a bill concerning the repression of abuses against armed forces. In an attempt to appease security unions backing the measure and civil society groups opposing it, Interior Minister Lotfi Brahem insisted before parliament’s General Legislation Commission on Wednesday that the Ministry is taking the concerns of all sides into consideration. Brahem proposed the creation of a joint committee to draft a new law that will protect security agents and their families « with consideration for human rights principles and in respect of constitutional provisions ». For now, the current controversial text remains in parliament for further examination.
While citizens and local authorities in a few regions have undertaken negotiations for employment and development, the government has yet to respond to protesters’ demands with a comprehensive strategy or solution. Instead, a union of the National Guard is implicated in the diffusion of fabricated images portraying violent protests, and police forces have begun to arrest young activists accused of “disrupting public order.”
Abdelmajid Jdey was being held in preventative detention Sidi Bouzid when, on 13 May, the Ministry of the Interior announced his death; according to the statement, Jdey hung himself in his cell. In the weeks that have followed, civil society activists and organizations including Human Rights Watch and the Tunisian Organization Against Torture (OCTT) have contested the Ministry’s announcement. Notably, the victim had filed a complaint of torture to OCTT several days prior to his death.
