The human rights organization Human Rights Watch (HRW) denounced, on Wednesday February 9, house arrests imposed in Tunisia as being in reality "secret detentions under cover of a state of emergency".

"The Tunisian authorities are concealing under certain house arrests secret detentions under the pretext of a state of emergency," HRW said in a statement, citing the cases of the former justice minister and number two of the Ennahda party, Noureddine. Bhiri, and Fethi Baldi, a leading executive of this party, a pet peeve of President Kaïs Saïed.

For HRW, "the excesses in the application" of such an "extrajudicial measure" in the name of exceptional legislation promulgated under former President Habib Bourguiba (1957-1987) and regularly extended, "have multiplied" since the coup by Kaïs Saïed, who assumed full powers on July 25 and “witnesses a dangerous escalation”.

No control of the judiciary

The NGO revealed at least two other house arrests with arrest and incommunicado, justified by the Ministry of the Interior, as for Fethi Baldi and Noureddine Bhiri, by suspicion of "serious threat to public security".

These two subpoenas were lifted a few days later.

"The exceptional measures granted by the emergency decree are used in an abusive manner and without judicial control" and "raise the specter of secret detentions", lamented Salsabil Chellali, head of HRW for Tunisia.

Noureddine Bhiri and Fethi Baldi were arrested and forcibly taken on January 31 by plainclothes agents to an unknown location.

Fethi Bhiri was hospitalized the next day in Bizerte (north) after the deterioration of his state of health while the exact place of detention of Noureddine Baldi remains secret.

Fethi Bhiri, on hunger strike and who initially refused to take his medication, is being fed and treated via drips, according to HRW.

"More than a month since their detention, neither Baldi nor Bhiri have received written notification of their house arrest", lambasted HRW, adding that "no arrest warrant has been issued and authorities have not disclosed any formal charges against them."

Only their families are authorized to visit them under police supervision, a situation already denounced by the Instance for the Prevention of Torture (INPT), an independent detention monitoring body.

With AFP

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