Tunisia… Extension of Detention for Brotherhood Leaders Accused of Terrorism
Yesterday, Thursday, the Tunisian judiciary extended the provisional detention of leaders from the Muslim Brotherhood on charges related to terrorism.
The investigating judge at the judicial counter-terrorism division decided to extend the pretrial detention for a period of 4 months for the prominent Brotherhood leader Habib Ellouz and the dismissed public prosecutor affiliated with the Brotherhood, Bashir Akrami, on charges of terrorism.
Brotherhood‘s Papers in Tunisia Fall Apart… Former Deputy Imprisoned Among the charges against Habib Ellouze and Bashir Akrami are “falsifying investigation reports, intervening in judicial investigations, assisting a person to escape legal proceedings, forming alliances, and joining a terrorist organization.”
Habib Ellouze, known for his strict religious stance, is considered one of the hawks within the Brotherhood and is known for his close positions to the “Ansar al-Sharia” organization, accused of assassinating Tunisian politicians Chokri Belaid and Mohamed Brahmi in 2013, at the behest of the Brotherhood-affiliated Ennahda Movement.
After the threads of the assassination of Belaid were uncovered after a complete 10 years, a detention warrant was issued against Ellouze in March of last year following a complaint filed against him by the defense team in the Belaid and Brahmi assassination case.
The judiciary had previously closed the case for which Ellouze was arrested when the apparatus was under Brotherhood control, before it was recently reopened.
In late 2012, Ellouze incited against the leftist leader Chokri Belaid, spreading unfounded allegations in an attempt to turn public opinion against him, after declaring him an apostate and sanctioning his blood.
Ellouze led propaganda campaigns in mosques as a parliamentarian elected in the 2011 elections, advocating for assassinations and excommunicating left-wing leaders.
Habib Ellouze is considered one of the founders of the “Islamic Tendency Movement,” which later became the Ennahdha Movement, where he chaired the Shura Council of the movement between 1980 and 1991, and then chaired the movement itself from June 1991 to September of the same year, the date of his arrest.
After 2011, Habib Ellouze became a deputy in the Constituent Assembly (transitional parliament) elected on October 23, 2011, representing the Ennahdha Movement in the Sfax Southeast constituency in Tunisia.
Bashir Akrami Last July, the Tunisian judiciary issued a detention warrant against Bashir Akrami on charges filed by the defense team of politicians Chokri Belaid and Mohamed Brahmi, related to crimes of treason, espionage, and contributing to stopping and obstructing all surveillance activities that would have revealed his involvement in the assassinations.
The defense team revealed that there is a case before the financial and economic judiciary regarding Akrami’s relationship with the financial secret service of the head of the Brotherhood-affiliated Ennahdha Movement, Rached Ghannouchi. They stated that “Akrami placed himself at the disposal of foreign countries, spied for them, and received money,” according to their statement.
In June of last year, Tunisian President Kais Saied decided to dismiss 57 judges, including the head of the dissolved Supreme Judicial Council and Bashir Akrami, amid accusations of corruption and covering up suspects in terrorism cases.
Akrami is widely described as the “man of the Ennahdha Movement and its tool to manipulate the judicial system for its interests.”
Akrami served as the investigating judge in the assassination case of opposition politicians Chokri Belaid and Mohamed Brahmi since 2013, before taking on the position of public prosecutor at the trial court starting from 2016.
His dismissal from his position, according to the presidential decree in June 2022, marked the beginning of lifting the cover that prevented the opening of the file of sending terrorists to conflict zones, covering up terrorist crimes, and obstructing investigations into thousands of terrorism-related cases.
