Politics

Tunisia-Belaïd and Brahmi case: 33 accused including Rached Ghannouchi

Rached Ghannouchi, leader of the Tunisian Islamist Ennahda party, checks his ballot behind a booth at a polling station in Ben Arous near the capital Tunis on May 6, 2018, as the country votes in the first free municipal elections since the 2011 revolution. - Tunisians head to the polls on May 6 in what is seen as another milestone on the road to democracy in the birthplace of the Arab Spring, despite muted interest in the poll as struggles with corruption and poverty continue. Though parliamentary and presidential votes have taken place since the fall of dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, municipal polls have been delayed four times due to logistic, administrative and political deadlocks. (Photo by FETHI BELAID / AFP)

Lawyer Imène Gzara, member of the defense lawyers panel in the case of martyrs, Chokri Belaid and Mohamed Brahmi said 33 individuals, including leader of the Ennahda movement, Rached Ghannouchi have been “officially charged of belonging to a terrorist organisation.”

In a statement to TAP, Gzara added that “the first investigating judge at the Judicial Counter-Terrorism Division has issued 17 charges against 33 suspects, including “membership in a terrorist organisation and money laundering.”

At a press briefing held on June 1, the defense lawyers committee of martyrs Belaïd and Brahmi had announced that 34 defendants in the case known as “the secret apparatus” of the Ennahdha, including Rached Ghannouchi, were banned from traveling.

It said the Ministry of the Interior had refused to comply with 17 judicial requests to provide the judiciary with documents relating to the circumstances of the assassination of the martyr Mohamed Brahmi, and others related to “the case of the apparatus of the Ennahdha movement.” The Department of the Interior will be prosecuted, it added.

(TAP)