Lawyer and columnist Sonia Dahmani was arrested in Tunis on Saturday May 11, after making sarcastic remarks about the situation in the country, a scene filmed by France 24 which was forced to stop its live broadcast.
On the evening of Saturday, May 11, security forces stormed the Lawyer’s House in Tunis and arrested Sonia Dahmani, a lawyer and columnist after making sarcastic remarks about the situation in the country, a scene filmed by France 24 which was forced to stop his live broadcast.
“Police assault on the Lawyer’s House”, located opposite the courthouse in Tunis, “lawyers attacked and kidnapping of colleague Sonia Dahmani (driven) to an unknown location”, indicated Dalila Msaddek, member from his defense team on Facebook.
Islam Hamza, another defender of the lawyer, confirmed “the arrest of Ms. Dahmani by police officers”.
The continuous news channel France 24, whose journalists were on site to cover the movement in support of the lawyer, was live at the time of the arrest. She strongly protested in a press release against the attitude of the hooded police officers who, according to her, “then headed towards the channel’s team, telling them to cut the camera under the strong protests of Maryline Dumas”, the journalist on site.
“The police ended up violently tearing the camera from its tripod, putting an end to the live broadcast of the scene, and arrested Hamdi Tlili. The cameraman was released after around ten minutes and the France 24 correspondent is fine” , added the channel, which broadcast images of the scene on X.
France 24 “strongly condemns this obstruction of press freedom and this brutal and intimidating intervention by the police preventing its journalists from practicing their profession, while they were covering a demonstration by lawyers for respect for justice and in support of freedom of expression,” the channel added.
“This is just another arrest in the ranks of people who speak out critically of the regime,” laments Hatem Nafti, Franco-Tunisian essayist, guest of BFMTV this Sunday, May 12.
“It’s clearly a desire to silence all criticism, to scare people, to say: ‘If you object, this is what will happen to you!’”
Accused of spreading “false information”
According to media reports, Sonia Dahmani is the subject of an investigation in particular for disseminating “false information with the aim of harming public safety” and “inciting hate speech”, under Decree-Law 54 .
This decree, promulgated in September 2022 by President Kais Saied, punishes with up to five years in prison anyone who uses information and communication networks to “write, produce, broadcast (or) spread false news (… ) with the aim of infringing the rights of others or harming public safety”.
Tuesday, during a television show, Sonia Dahmani ironically launched “what extraordinary country are we talking about?”, in response to another columnist who had just stated that migrants from several countries from sub-Saharan Africa were looking to settle in Tunisia. This statement was judged by some users on social networks as “degrading” for the image of Tunisia.
On Thursday, Sonia Dahmani received a summons, which she did not respond to, to appear on Friday before an investigating judge without the reasons being specified, according to Msaddek. The lawyer and columnist explained to the press that she refused to appear in court “without knowing the reasons for this summons”. Due to his absence, the investigating judge in charge of this case issued a warrant for his arrest.
In a year and a half, more than 60 people, including journalists, lawyers and opponents of Kais Saied, have been prosecuted on the basis of this text, according to the National Union of Journalists.
