Tunisia court upholds long sentences in mass trial of opposition figures
Tunisia's Court of Cassation on Thursday upheld prison sentences of up to 45 years issued in November against 34 opposition leaders, lawyers and businessmen on charges of conspiracy, their lawyers told reporters.
Prominent opposition figures Ghazi Chaouachi, Issam Chebbi, Jawhar Ben Mbarek and Ridha Belhaj were sentenced to 20 years in prison, while politician Noureddine Bhiri received 10 years.
National Salvation Front leader Nejib Chebbi was sentenced to 12 years.
The opposition said the ruling, which is the final stage of the three-year legal proceedings and cannot be appealed, reinforces President Kais Saied's's authoritarian rule.
Lawyer and opposition figure Dalila Msaddek, Mbarek's sister, said in a Facebook post that "the legal battle is now over".
"What begins is a purely political battle."
Forty people were charged with conspiring to overthrow the president in one of Tunisia's largest recent political prosecutions. Twenty fled abroad and were sentenced in absentia.
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Judiciary's independence questioned
"The ruling confirms that the judiciary is not independent," said lawyer Haifa Chebbi, daughter of prominent opposition figure Nejib Chebbi.
"Opponents entered prison by political decision and will leave when Saied falls," she said.
Chebbi and other lawyers had said they were only notified of the hearing on Monday, arguing it did not provide them with enough time to prepare the defence.
Saied has said the judiciary remains independent and that he would not become a dictator. In 2023, when most of the defendants were arrested, he said the politicians were "traitors and terrorists" and that judges who would acquit them were their accomplices.
Tunisia's justice minister has said the defendants tried to destabilise the country and overthrow Saied.
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Rights groups say Saied has controlled the judiciary since suspending parliament and seizing extraordinary powers in 2021, ruling by decree, dissolving the independent Supreme Judicial Council and sacking dozens of judges in 2022.
On Wednesday, Human Rights Watch warned that the independent civic space created after the 2011 revolution has been all but shut down.
Human rights group Amnesty International had called on Tunisian authorities on Wednesday to "rectify a travesty of justice that has upturned the lives of 34 prominent opposition figures, human rights defenders and lawyers who were convicted on unfounded charges".
(with newswires)