{"id":607016,"date":"2023-02-11T23:49:33","date_gmt":"2023-02-12T05:49:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.sellorbuyhomefast.com\/index.php\/2023\/02\/11\/tunisian-police-detain-prominent-politician-and-businessman-their-lawyers-say\/"},"modified":"2023-02-11T23:49:33","modified_gmt":"2023-02-12T05:49:33","slug":"tunisian-police-detain-prominent-politician-and-businessman-their-lawyers-say","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2023\/02\/11\/tunisian-police-detain-prominent-politician-and-businessman-their-lawyers-say\/","title":{"rendered":"Tunisian police detain prominent politician and businessman, their lawyers say"},"content":{"rendered":"
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By Tarek Amara<\/p>\n

TUNIS (Reuters) -Tunisian police detained politicians and a prominent, politically connected businessman on Saturday, their lawyers said, in a case that local media said was based on suspicion of conspiracy against state security.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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A spokesperson for the Interior Ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the arrests of Khayam Turki, a former finance minister, and Kamel Ltaif, a construction magnate with close ties to successive coalition governments. <\/p>\n

Local media said that the police later arrested the Abd El Hamid Jlassi, a former senior official in Ennahda Islamist party and a fierce critic of President Kais Saied, on charges of plotting against state security. <\/p>\n

A former diplomat and a retired military officer were also arrested according Attessia TV and Mosaique FM radio.<\/p>\n

Ennahda, an Islamist party that is the biggest in the opposition, said the arrest of Turki was aimed at intimidating the president\u2019s opponents. <\/p>\n

The Salvation Front, the main opposition coalition against Saied, condemned his arrest, saying police had questioned him several times for meeting opposition figures at his home. <\/p>\n

Rights groups have voiced increasing concern over political freedoms in Tunisia since Saied\u2019s seizure of most powers in 2021 and his moves to assume ultimate authority over the judiciary. <\/p>\n

Neither Turki nor Ltaif have been prominent critics of the president. <\/p>\n

Saied\u2019s political opponents, whom he has labelled traitors, have accused him of a coup aimed at dismantling the democracy built after the 2011 revolution. <\/p>\n

Saied has denied that, saying his moves were lawful and needed to save Tunisia from chaos. He has promised to uphold rights and freedoms won in the revolution. <\/p>\n

Over recent months authorities have arrested or opened investigations into several of Saied\u2019s political opponents. <\/p>\n

Turki, a former leading figure in Ettakatol party, was at one stage proposed by a coalition of parties as a candidate for prime minister. Police raided his house to arrest him at dawn, his lawyer Abdel Aziz Sid said by phone. <\/p>\n

The local Mosaique FM radio station said Turki\u2019s arrest was on suspicion of plotting against state security, without citing a source. <\/p>\n

The businessman, Ltaif, was also arrested at his home, his lawyer Redha Bel Hadj said by phone. Tunisian analysts describe him as an influential figure since the revolution. <\/p>\n

(Reporting by Tarek Amara and Moaz Abd-Alaziz,; writing by Angus McDowall; editing by Clelia Oziel and David Gregorio)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\n Reuters<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Tarek Amara TUNIS (Reuters) -Tunisian police detained politicians and a prominent, politically connected businessman on Saturday, their lawyers said, in a case that local media said was based on suspicion of conspiracy against state security. A spokesperson for the Interior Ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the arrests of<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":607017,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[294,116979],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-607016","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-police","8":"category-tunisian"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/607016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=607016"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/607016\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/607017"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=607016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=607016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=607016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}