Tunisia: Adala for All condemns the sentencing of lawyer Sonia Dahmani to one year in prison on the basis of Presidential Decree 54/2022
On 5 July 2024, the Tunisian Court of First Instance sentenced Tunisian lawyer and media figure Sonia Dahmani to one year in prison. Dahmani was referred to prosecution for her anti-racist stance and statement “this country is not an extraordinary place to live in.” On 11 May 2024, Dahmani was arrested in a humiliating and intimidating manner by hooded security officers who stormed Tunisia’s Bar Association in Tunis.
The hooded security officers raided the Bar Association’s headquarters and arrested lawyer Sonia Dahmani, who was holding a sit-in. Dahmani’s arrest created a wave of condemnation from human rights bodies in Tunisia and abroad, and further led to protests by lawyers, strikes, and days of public outrage.
Adala for All association (AFA) considers Dahmani’s sentence unjust and an escalation and flagrant violation of the right to freedom of opinion, expression, and the press in Tunisia, aiming to terrorize citizens and civil society activists.
AFA strongly condemns the failure to respond to the Complaint No. 32826 of lawyer Mehdi Zagrouba, issued by more than 1,600 lawyers at the Tunisian Court of First Instance. Zagrouba was assaulted and arrested two days after the arrest of lawyer Dahmani at Tunisia’s Bar Association, amid a wave of repression against lawyers and journalists last May. AFA further considers the authorities’ violations to establish legal evidence of their involvement in systematic crimes of torture and admission thereof.
AFA previously sent an official communication to the United Nations Special Rapporteurs on recent violations of the rights of lawyers and journalists and incitement against irregular migrants in Tunisia, with the demands:
1. Undertake all necessary measures and procedures to investigate the frequent violations of human rights in Tunisia.
2. Consider the existence of gross violations of rights.
3. Consider the possibility of scheduling a visit to Tunisia to assess the situation of the rights in question.
4. Issue an urgent appeal to the Tunisian state to cease these violations, stop incitement and smear campaigns against lawyers, journalists, civil society activists, and immigrants in Tunisia, implement Organic Law 50 of 2018 on the elimination of all forms of racial discrimination, and respect criminal procedures and human rights requirements in relevant national and international texts, including respecting the independence of judges and lawyers.
5. Call on the Tunisian state to respect its constitution and national laws, including the prevention of torture and the prevention of impunity from accountability and punishment, and guarantees of press freedom, and the application of Decree 115/2011 on the independence of the legal profession and Decree-Law no. 2011-79, on the organization of the legal profession.
Adala for All Association condemns the frequent and grave political prosecutions since President Kais Saied’s coup on 25 July 2021 against the Constitution of the Republic of Tunisia, according to the decision of the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights: The matter of Ibrahim Belguith V. Republic of Tunisia Application NO. 017/2021 judgment on 22 September 2022.
Adala For All further condemns Saied’s seizure of all judicial, legislative and executive powers, and his attack on the judicial institution in an unprecedented escalation of wholesale human rights violations and total disregard for laws and procedures. AFA believes that this environment is impossible to provide a democratic climate for the elections scheduled for 6 October 2024.
