First Independent Mena Newspaper
The authoritarian regime of Kais Saied will be hit with severe U.S. sanctions for dismantling Tunisia’s democracy, jailing political opponents, and escalating crackdown against human rights activists. The announcement was made by U.S. Congressman Joe Wilson in a letter addressed to Tunisian MP Fatma Msebbi who had called on him to apologize for his harsh […]
Tunisia’s Ennahda moderate Islamist party denounced the additional 22-year sentence against its leader Rached Ghannouchi and former Prime Minister as a “political trial” and “a blatant assault on the independence and impartiality of the judiciary and a blatant politicization of its procedures and rulings.” Former speaker of the parliament Ghannouchi was sentenced on the charge […]
In a significant move, the President of Tunisia dismissed Sihem Boughdiri from her position as Finance Minister on Wednesday February 5, appointing Michkat Khaldi, a prominent judge, as her replacement. Khaldi, who took the official oath at Carthage Palace, assumes the role at a time when the country’s economic situation is dire. Boughdiri, who had […]
The Algerian regime has blocked all attempts to bring closer the peoples of the Maghreb, former Tunisian president Moncef Marzouki said. Algeria has stood against all Maghreb integration initiatives, Marzouki, who led Tunisia from 2011 to 2014, said in a recent interview. While in office, Marzouki has tried to bring the two Maghreban heavy weights, […]
Tunisian authorities have been involved in a slave trade wherein migrants have been sold to Libyan militias for as little as 13 dollars, a report by rights watchdogs said. The report, presented on Wednesday to the EU Parliament, includes testimonies from 30 sub-Saharan migrants who have endured degrading treatment in Tunisia. Dubbed State Trafficking: Expulsion […]
US Comgressman Joe Wilson urged his country to stop offering aid to Tunisia due to the anti-American stands of its autocratic president Kais Saied and his crackdown on civil liberties. In a series of posts on X, Wilson decried the oppressive nature of the Tunisian regime, which he called “a police state dictatorship.” “In 2023, […]
Tunisian lawmakers are currently deliberating a controversial draft law that would allow the deportation of “irregular” migrants to their home countries, as tensions rise around anti-migrant sentiment and xenophobic conspiracy theories. This proposal comes after the Government claimed to have successfully repatriated over 7,000 migrants “voluntarily” last year. However, human rights groups have voiced concerns, […]
Human Rights Watch has denounced in its 2025 report the escalating repression of critical voices in Tunisia of Kais Saied, saying the authorities undermined the integrity of the October presidential election and carried out politically motivated arrests & arbitrary detentions of prospective challengers before the vote. “It is clear that Tunisian authorities deployed all their […]
Evoking the colonial origins of Algeria’s current borders is a taboo issue in Algeria that can send those who venture to tell the truth to jail. That was the fate of Boualem Sansal who said in an interview with a French TV channel that western territories of today’s Algeria have been part of Morocco. Sansal […]
The number of suicides among Tunisian migrants in Italian prisons has been rising, raising serious concerns. Former MP and civil society activist Majdi Karbai drew attention to this troubling trend end of December, following the death of a Tunisian migrant in Piacenza prison, located in northern Italy. Karbai, alongside Tunisian NGOs, has been sounding the […]