{"id":38400,"date":"2025-12-22T07:11:45","date_gmt":"2025-12-22T06:11:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dzwatch.dz\/?p=38400"},"modified":"2025-12-22T07:11:53","modified_gmt":"2025-12-22T06:11:53","slug":"mass-hunger-strike-in-tunisia-over-political-detainees","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dzwatch.dz\/?p=38400","title":{"rendered":"Mass Hunger Strike in Tunisia Over Political Detainees"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Tunis, Tunisia<\/strong> &#8211; Members of Tunisia&#8217;s opposition National Salvation Front (NSF) and their supporters have initiated a mass hunger strike in solidarity with detained lawyer Ayachi Hammami and other political prisoners, the NSF announced late Sunday. The strike began Monday.<\/p>\n<p>In a statement, the NSF expressed solidarity with &#8220;all detainees who have turned their cells into arenas of struggle against tyranny,&#8221; protesting what they described as policies criminalizing political and civil action, as well as freedom of expression. The front also announced its support for a symbolic solidarity hunger strike planned for Monday, with members of its executive board and supporters participating.<\/p>\n<p>The decision comes in response to the hunger strike of political prisoner Ayachi Hammami and other political detainees who answered his call for a collective three-day hunger strike, starting December 22nd. They are protesting the deprivation of their freedom and detention by a judiciary the NSF deems &#8220;lacking independence and subject to the executive authority.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Prior to this, Tunisian lawyers announced on Saturday that they would begin a collective hunger strike on Monday in solidarity with &#8220;detainees and prisoners of conscience&#8221; and in rejection of what they consider &#8220;unfair trials.&#8221; The announcement came in a statement signed by 32 lawyers, including former bar association heads Abdelrazak Kilani and Shawki Tabib.<\/p>\n<p>Authorities arrested Hammami on December 2nd, acting on a court ruling sentencing him to five years in prison on charges including &#8220;conspiracy against state security.&#8221; Hammami previously served as Minister of Human Rights and head of the National Authority for the Defense of Freedoms and Democracy, a non-governmental organization.<\/p>\n<p>The case dates back to February 2023, when opposition politicians, lawyers, and civil society activists were arrested and charged with offenses including &#8220;attempting to undermine public order and state security,&#8221; &#8220;espionage with foreign entities,&#8221; and &#8220;incitement to chaos or rebellion.&#8221; On November 28th, the Tunis Court of Appeal issued prison sentences ranging from 5 to 45 years against the defendants. Among those convicted is the head of the National Salvation Front.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/dzwatch.dz\/?cat=1\">More Algeria articles on DZWatch<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/dzwatch.dz\">DZWatch &#8211; Your News Portal<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Tunis, Tunisia &#8211; Members of Tunisia&#8217;s opposition National Salvation Front (NSF) and their supporters have initiated a mass hunger strike in solidarity with detained lawyer Ayachi Hammami and other political prisoners, the NSF announced late Sunday. The strike began Monday.<\/p>\n<p><...\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":38401,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"rank_math_lock_modified_date":false,"cybocfi_hide_featured_image":"","iawp_total_views":6,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-38400","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-algeria"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dzwatch.dz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38400","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dzwatch.dz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dzwatch.dz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dzwatch.dz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dzwatch.dz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=38400"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dzwatch.dz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38400\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":38402,"href":"https:\/\/dzwatch.dz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38400\/revisions\/38402"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dzwatch.dz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/38401"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dzwatch.dz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=38400"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dzwatch.dz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=38400"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dzwatch.dz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=38400"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}