Tunisia to free some political prisoners

Tunisia announced that it has freed 1,298 prisoners and granted conditional parole to 359 others. Some of these 1657 prisoners, including 70 members of the banned An-Nahda party, the editor of the Islamist newspaper Al-Fajr.

The United States said it encourages the government of Tunisia to continue to take further actions consistent with its declared intentions to engage in greater democratic reform. "We look to Tunisia to accelerate reforms that create a more open and vibrant political space in which all parties, civil society organizations, and released prisoners can operate more freely. In this context, the United States regrets the Tunisian government's decision to ban a peaceful demonstration on February 24 by legal opposition parties and similar moves to limit the ability of those parties to express their views."

The Arabic Network for Human Rights Information (HRinfo) in a release spoke of the continuation of the detention of lawyer and human rights writer, Mohammed Abbou as a result of an article posted on the Internet on 28 February 2005. Abbou was sentenced to three years and a half imprisonment, exactly year ago, as a result of this article in which he criticized the human rights situation in Tunisia.

The organization said the pardon comes this time to cover over a ban on a demonstration demanding liberties and the release of opinion prisoners in Tunisia, in addition to the approaching 50th anniversary of Tunisian independence.