Italy’s Leader Keeps The Focus On Migration On Her Fourth Visit To Tunisia In A Year

Tunisian President Kais Saied, left, shakes hands with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, in Tunis, Wednesday, April 17, 2024. (Slim Abid, Tunisian Presidential Palace via AP)

BY BOUAZZA BEN BOUAZZA AND SAM METZ

TUNIS, TUNISIA (AP) — The head of Italy’s right-wing government acknowledged Wednesday that Tunisia cannot serve as a dumping ground for migrants, days after Tunisia’s president reaffirmed his unwillingness to let Europe outsource migration problems by sending those not welcome there to his country.

Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni said during a visit to Tunisia — her fourth in the past year — that the North African nation “cannot become the arrival point for migrants coming from the rest of Europe.”

However, she sidestepped tensions over how to manage migration via the Mediterranean Sea and instead praised Tunisia and Italy’s shared priorities in fighting human traffickers and repatriating African migrants back to their home countries.

Meloni and Tunisian President Kais Saied signed new accords as part of Italy’s “Mattei Plan” for Africa, a continent-wide strategy aimed at growing economic opportunities and preventing migration to Europe.

They included education initiatives and 50 million euros ($53 million) in a budgetary aid package earmarked for renewable energy projects. Meloni also promised to expand efforts to repatriate migrants to their home countries and expand legal migration pathways for Tunisians to work in Italy.

“It is essential that we work together to continue to fight the slavers of the third millennium, the mafia organizations that exploit the legitimate aspirations of those who would like a better life,” Meloni said, referring to smugglers who facilitate migrants’ perilous sea journey.

European leaders often frame migration as a human trafficking issue, though migrants are known to make the trip in various ways and for a variety of reasons.

Nearly 16,000 migrants have made the treacherous journey from North Africa to Italy so far in 2024, travelling hundreds of kilometers (miles) from the shores of Algeria, Tunisia and Libya, mainly to islands off the Italian mainland. Arrivals tend to increase through spring and summer.

As weather warmed early this year, more migrants arrived with each passing month — a trend that’s on track to maintain its pace through April.

Less than half as many migrants had arrived in Italy as of April 15, compared to the same period in 2023, according to figures from the U.N. refugee agency. That’s in part because of Tunisia’s border patrol force, which this year intercepted about 21,000 migrants before they crossed into European waters.

Despite the interceptions, Saied has long insisted he is unwilling to let his country become Europe’s “border guard” or accept migrants that Europe wants to deport.

Earlier this week, he said he had no intention of opening detention centers for migrants in an agreement similar to Italy’s deal with Albania on asylum seekers. “We will not accept the presence of people outside the law, and Tunisia will not be a victim,” Saied said.

North African countries, from Morocco to Egypt, enjoy some leverage in their relations with Europe due to their role in helping control the flow of migrants. Italy and its European Union counterparts have pledged substantial financial support to countries on the other side of the Mediterranean to help prevent migration and trafficking.

But most of the more than 1 billion euros ($1.1 billion) promised to Tunisia as part of an EU agreement brokered in July is contingent on the country reaching an agreement with the International Monetary Fund on a stalled bailout package that could require painful spending cuts.

The broader EU package includes 105 million euros ($112 million) earmarked for migration. Romdhane Ben Amor, a spokesperson for the Tunisian Forum for Economic and Social Rights, which closely follows the migration assistance, said much of it has yet to be disbursed.
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Metz reported from Rabat, Morocco. Associated Press writer Giada Zampano in Rome contributed to this report.

A Military Court Convicts Tunisian Opposition Activist Chaima Issa Of Undermining Security

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Chaima Issa, a leading figure in the coalition of parties opposed to President Kais Saied, flashes a victory sign outside of a military court in Tunis, Tunisia on Tuesday, December 12, 2023. (AP Photo/Hassene Dridi).

PARIS (AP) — A military court in Tunisia convicted a prominent opposition activist of undermining state security and gave her a one-year suspended prison sentence Wednesday, according to a defense lawyer.

The lawyer representing Chaima Issa denounced the verdict but expressed satisfaction that she would remain free and plans to appeal.

“Chaima Issa should have been acquitted because all she did was to peacefully use her right to freedom of expression,” attorney Samir Dilou told The Associated Press.

Public prosecutors began investigating Issa, a leader in a coalition of parties opposed to President Kais Saied, after she criticized authorities on Tunisia’s most prominent radio station in February. She was jailed from that month to July.

According to her lawyer, Issa was charged with spreading fake news and accused of trying to incite the military to disobey orders and undermine public security as part of an alleged plot hatched after she met with foreign diplomats and other opposition figures.





She criticized the charges as politically motivated before walking into the military court hearing on Tuesday.

After the military court rendered its decision Wednesday, human rights group Amnesty International urged Tunisian authorities to “quash this outrageous conviction immediately.”

“Issa, much like dozens of other critics who are being judicially harassed or arbitrarily detained for months, is guilty of nothing more than questioning the decisions made by a government that, from the outset, has demonstrated an unwillingness to tolerate any form of dissent,” the group said in a statement.

Critics of the Tunisian president have increasingly faced prosecution and arrests. More than 20 have been charged in military courts with “plotting against state security.”

Tunisians overthrew a repressive regime in 2011 in the first uprising of the region-wide movement that later became known as the Arab Spring. The nation of 12 million people became a success story after it adopted a new constitution and held democratic elections.

But since taking office in 2019, Saied has sacked prime ministers, suspended the country’s parliament and rewritten the constitution to consolidate his power.

A range of activists and political party leaders have been jailed, including Rached Ghannouchi, the leader of the Islamist movement Ennahda.

Tunisian Minister Concedes ‘Small Groups’ Of Migrants Were Pushed Back Into Desert No Man’s Land

Migrants gather in a desert area on the Libyan side of the Tunisia-Libya border on Sunday, July 23, 2023...(AP Photo/Yousef Murad, File)

BY BOUAZZA BEN BOUAZZA

TUNIS, TUNISIA (AP) — Tunisia’s interior minister conceded that small groups of sub-Saharan migrants trying to enter the country are pushed back into the desert border areas with Libya and Algeria, but labeled as “false allegations” claims by the U.N., humanitarian groups and migrants themselves of mistreatment.

In an interview with The Associated Press Wednesday, Kamel Fekih said that while there is no “collective” expulsion of migrants, small groups trying to enter Tunisia are pushed back into the desert no man’s land.

However, he disputed remarks earlier this week by the deputy spokesman for the U.N. Secretary-General, Farhan Haq, who called on Tuesday for an “immediate end” to “the expulsion of migrants, refugees and asylum seekers from Tunisia to the borders with Libya and also Algeria.”

“What is this monsieur from the U.N. talking about?” the Tunisian interior minister said in the interview Wednesday. “There are no collective deportations by us.”

But he did say that “there are just little groups of 6 to 12 people who are pushed back” because they don’t have papers. He said that three bodies of migrants had been found in the desert frontiers between Libya and Algeria, to the north, but added the dead were found outside Tunisian territory.

Tunisia’s eastern coast, notably the port city of Sfax, has become the main launching point for migrants, mostly from sub-Saharan Africa, to get to Italy and other parts of Europe in small boats. With migrants pouring into Sfax and other points, tensions have risen between the local population and migrants, culminating last month with the death of a Tunisian in the city.

In recent months, security forces began removing some migrants from the city, bussing them elsewhere and, migrants say, dumping some of them in the desert. The AP is among media outlets who have spoken to migrants abandoned in a no-man’s land in dire conditions. Temperatures in the desert last month routinely exceeded 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit).

Fekih said that 1,057 migrants had agreed to be returned home by July 20.

There are currently some 80,000 undocumented migrants in Tunisia, concentrated on the coast, with 17,000 in Sfax, he said.

President Kais Saied triggered anti-migrant fervor in February, saying the “hordes” of migrants were part of a plot to erase Tunisia’s identity and change its demography. The interior minister reiterated, without elaborating, more recent claims by Saied that an organ trafficking business has sprouted up around migrants.

“It is a large-scale migration … that sometimes engenders violence aggravated by the emergence of gangs that deal in the trafficking of humans and their organs and sell migrants fragile vessels called ‘boats of death’ that put their lives in danger and often sink at sea,” the interior minister said. From January to July 20, the bodies of 901 migrants had been pulled from the waters off the Tunisian coast, he added.

Some migrants have said they were beaten by Tunisian security officials, their possessions taken from them in some cases. The minister dismissed their claims, saying they had been “manipulated” in the hope of getting favors from organizations who deal with migration.

Photos, video and interviews with migrants in the no-man’s land between Tunisia and Libya that went viral on social media have dented Tunisia’s image as a friendly North African country, a reputation that officials are trying to repair.

Some entertainers, including rappers, have canceled their summer concerts in Tunisia, apparently as fall-out from the migrant crisis. Among them were rappers Bigflo and Oli who were to perform Wednesday in Carthage, outside Tunis where the presidential palace is located. They said on Instagram that they did not want to perform, given the current situation, and would give the money they were to earn to the humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders.

Because Tunisia has no borders with sub-Saharan Africa, migrants are forced to pass through Algeria or Libya — which do — to reach Tunisia, Fetih noted. “There are no collective pushbacks, but these (illegal) migrants are stopped from entering Tunisian territory because they come from Algeria and Libya.”

Haq, the U.N. deputy spokesman, reiterated Tuesday that “migrants, refugees and asylum seekers must be protected and treated with dignity … regardless of their status and in accordance with international human rights and refugee law.”

The interior minister said the short-term solution was to return migrants to their homeland, in cooperation with their countries and human rights organizations, because “Tunisia cannot support this large number of undocumented sub-Saharan migrants.”

Associated Press reporter Elaine Ganley in Paris contributed to this report.

Tunisian Journalist Sentenced To 5 Years In Prison For Counterterrorism Reporting

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Khalifa Guesme

TUNIS, TUNISIA (AP) — A Tunisian appeals court has sentenced a journalist to five years in prison for revealing details of a counterterrorism operation and refusing to reveal his sources, according to his lawyer, prompting outcry from media rights advocates.

Khalifa Guesmi’s lawyer said he would appeal to Tunisia’s highest court. More than 30 rights groups issued a statement denouncing the conviction and expressing concern about a growing crackdown on dissent.

It appeared to be the worst sentence against a journalist in Tunisia since the 2011 Arab Spring revolution pushed out a long-serving autocrat and ushered in a new democratic system with more media freedom.

Guesmi had been sentenced to one year in prison by a lower court. Counterterrorism judges at the Tunis appeals court on Monday upheld the conviction and toughened the sentence to five years, Guesmi said in a Facebook post Tuesday.

Guesmi was convicted of intentionally divulging sensitive security information in an article about counterterrorism arrests in the Kairouan region where he is based, and then refusing to reveal his sources, according to his lawyer Rahal Jalleli.

Jalleli called the appeals court decision “unjust.” Speaking on Mosaique FM, a privately owned Tunisian radio station, he said the source of the information was a security official who has been convicted and sentenced to 10 years in prison for his role.

The national journalists’ union SNJT said the prison sentence “threatens the freedom of journalists and damages Tunisia’s image. It is a political message that testifies to an acceleration in punishment of the media and journalists, to intimidate them via the judicial apparatus.”

Journalists’ union president Yassine Jelassi called it a “disgrace for the Tunisian state.” He said 20 journalists were currently facing prosecution related to their work.

The union called for a sit-in protest on Thursday to defend media freedom and the values of the pro-democracy uprising.

Syria And Tunisia Restore Diplomatic Ties After A decade

FILE - Border customs officials inspect a truck loaded with United Nations humanitarian aid for Syria following a devastating earthquake at the Bab al-Hawa border crossing with Turkey, in Syria's Idlib province, on Feb. 10, 2023. A U.N. commission said Monday, March 13, that the international community and the Syrian government did not act quickly last month to help people in need in the rebel-held northwest of Syria in the first critical days after the earthquake hit. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed, File)

BEIRUT (AP) — Syria will reopen its embassy in Tunisia after the North African country announced the appointment of a new ambassador to Damascus, Syrian state media reported Wednesday.

Tunisia has become the latest Arab state to reestablish diplomatic ties with Syria, after cutting off relations a decade ago.

The move by Tunisian President Kais Saied to appoint a new ambassador was immediately approved and reciprocated by the Syrian government, a joint statement from the two countries’ foreign ministries read, according to Syrian state news agency SANA.

The announcement is the latest step in a regional trend of rapprochement with the war-torn country, which has picked up pace since the deadly Feb. 6 earthquake in Syria and Turkey and the Chinese-brokered reestablishment of ties between Saudi Arabia and Iran.

Syria was widely shunned by Arab governments over Syrian President Bashar Assad’s brutal crackdown on protesters and later civilians in an uprising-turned-civil war that began in 2011. The breakdown in relations culminated with Syria being ousted from the Arab League. Tunis shut down its embassy in Damascus in 2012.


Earlier this year, Assad visited Oman and the United Arab Emirates, two nations that had backed fighters trying to topple his government. The Syrian government is reportedly in talks with Saudi Arabia to reopen their embassies in each other’s nations.

Saudi Arabia is hosting the next Arab League summit in May, where most states hope to restore Syria’s membership, the league’s secretary-general, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, has said.

Elections Shine Spotlight On Tunisia’s Troubled Democracy

A Tunisian votes in the second round of the legislative elections in Tunis, Sunday, Jan. 29, 2023. Tunisia's president and its shaky democracy are facing an important test Sunday as voters cast ballots in the second round of parliamentary elections. Turnout was just 11% in the first round of voting last month. (AP Photo/Hassene Dridi)

BY BOUAZZA BEN BOUAZZA

TUNIS, TUNISIA (AP) — Tunisia’s president and its shaky, decade-long experiment with democracy are facing an important test Sunday as voters cast ballots in the second round of parliamentary elections.

Turnout was just 11% in the first round of voting last month, according to the electoral commission, as many disaffected Tunisians stayed away and the influential Islamist party Ennahdha and other opposition movements boycotted.

The runoff elections Sunday are being watched around the Arab world. They’re seen as a conclusive step in President Kais Saied’s push to consolidate power, tame Islamist rivals and win back lenders and investors needed to save the teetering economy.

Voters are choosing lawmakers to replace the last parliament, led by Ennahdha, which Saied suspended in 2021 and later disbanded. He then had the constitution rewritten to give more power to the president and less to the legislature.

Analysts note a growing crisis of confidence between citizens and the political class since Tunisia’s 2011 revolution unleashed Arab Spring uprisings across the region, and led Tunisians to create a new democratic political system once seen as a model.

At a voting station in the Tunis suburb of Soukra, people trickled in to mark their ballots and drop them in a plastic box.

In the first-round elections, 23 candidates secured seats outright in the 161-seat parliament, either because they ran unopposed or because they won more than 50% of the vote.


In Sunday’s runoff, voters are choosing among 262 candidates seeking to fill 131 seats. No candidates bothered to run in seven other constituencies; electoral officials say those seats will be filled in special elections at a later date.

At a Tunis food market ahead of Sunday’s vote, few people seemed to think a new parliament would solve their problems. Vendors struggled to sell their wares as shoppers lamented rising prices.

The opposition Work and Achievement Party was among those boycotting the elections, and held a meeting Sunday instead in their Tunis offices.

“Kaies Saied, when he wrote his constitution and ignored the committee he formed to write a new constitution, he wanted parliament to be a group of people in a closed place who had no influence on the situation of the country,” party chief Abdellatif Meki told The Associated Press.

“The next parliament has no control over the government. So for parliament members who make promises to the people, what is the mechanism by which they will keep their promises?” he asked.

Polls close at 6 p.m. (1700 GMT), except in restive regions near the Algerian and Libyan borders where authorities are limiting voting hours for security reasons. The turnout rate — an important sign of the elections’ legitimacy — is expected to be announced Sunday evening, and the election results in the ensuing days.

Saied and his supporters argued that his overhaul of Tunisian politics was needed to end political deadlock seen as worsening economic and social crises. Unemployment tops 18%, the soaring budget deficit has led to shortages of staples, and the International Monetary Fund has frozen talks on a much-awaited new loan for the Tunisian government.

Saied’s popularity has sunk since his election in 2019, as evidenced by a video shared online of an impromptu visit he made to a cafe in Tunis amid campaigning earlier this month.

“God willing, we will provide you with everything you need ... as long as you have hope,” he told a group of young people.

One retorted, “We don’t have hope.”

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Mehdi El-Arem in Tunis and Angela Charlton in Paris contributed.

Thousands Protest In Tunisia Against President’s Rule

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Security forces stand guard as Tunisians gather during a protest against Tunisian President Kais Saied in downtown Tunis, Tunisia, Saturday Jan. 14, 2023. Tunisians mark 12 years since Tunisian protesters unleashed Arab Spring uprisings around the region. The protest comes after disastrous parliamentary elections last month in which just 11% of voters cast ballots. It also comes as the country is going through a major economic crisis, with inflation and joblessness on the rise. (AP Photo/Hassene Dridi)

TUNIS, TUNISIA (AP) — Thousands of protesters angry at Tunisia’s economic crisis and the president’s increasingly authoritarian drift marched on Saturday through the capital, responding to a call from opposition parties to mark 12 years since Tunisian protesters unleashed Arab Spring uprisings around the region.

The protest move comes after disastrous parliamentary elections last month in which just 11% of voters cast ballots. The elections are meant to replace and reshape a legislature that President Kais Saied dissolved in 2021. The second round has been set for Jan. 29.

It also comes as the country is going through a major economic crisis, with inflation and joblessness on the rise. Tunisians have been hit with soaring food prices and shortages of fuel and basic staples like sugar, vegetable oil and rice in recent months.

The National Salvation Front, a coalition of five opposition parties, including the popular Islamist opposition party Ennahdha, had called for the march in central Tunis.

The Habib Bourguiba avenue, the main artery of the capital and a key site for the revolution, had been placed under high security, with metal barriers, drones and surveillance cameras in place to monitor the crowd.

Demonstrators shouting “Kais Saied, go out” and “No to dictatorship, yes to dialogue and democracy,” amid other mottos, were prevented from getting close to the Interior Ministry.


The President of the Tunisian Human Rights League, Bassem Trifi, said authorities banned protesters from other cities of the country to come to Tunis to take part in the march.

Prominent opposition politician Ahmed Nejib Chebbi said “Tunisia’s salvation can only come through Kais Saied’s departure.”

The head of the Workers’ Party, Hamma Hammami, said “Kais Saied will either end up in prison or flee abroad. His dictatorial regime will fall, like the one of ousted President Ben Ali.”

On Jan. 14, 2011, then President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali was forced out of power, transforming the country into a budding democracy that inspired the Arab Spring. Ben Ali died in 2019.

“We are here to say ‘stop’ to the process of destruction of the state engaged by Kais Saied,” said Abassi Hammami, the head of the National Comittee for the Protection of Freedoms. “We must open new perspectives for our country.”

The head of the Republican Party, Issam Chebbi, said opponents will continue their fight to relaunch the democratic process and help the country get out of the political, economic and social crisis it is going through.

Saied, who was elected in 2019, has curbed the independence of the judiciary and weakened parliament’s powers.

In a referendum in July last year, Tunisians voters approved a constitution that hands broad executive powers to the president. Saied, who spearheaded the project and wrote the text himself, made full use of the mandate in September, changing the electoral law to diminish the role of political parties.

In an apparent response to criticism, Saied on Friday paid a surprise visit to the Bourguiba avenue and went through the capital’s historic district, the medina. He called for caution against “intruders and renegades” who could mix with protesters to provoke clashes.

The Jan. 14 anniversary has been abolished as an official commemoration date by Saied, who instead declared Dec. 17 as the “revolution day.”

Tunisia’s uprising began on Dec. 17, 2010, when a desperate fruit vendor set himself on fire, unleashing pent-up anger and frustration among his compatriots, who staged protests that spread nationwide and led to the revolution.

Empty Shelves Or Unaffordable Food: Tunisia’s Crisis Deepens

People shop at a supermarket, in Tunis, Tunisia, Monday, Oct. 10, 2022. Sugar, vegetable oil, rice, even bottled water – Tunisians have suffered shortages of multiple staples in recent weeks. And costs are soaring on products still available. (AP Photo/Hassene Dridi)

BY BOUAZZA BEN BOUAZZA

TUNIS, TUNISIA (AP) — Tunisians have been hit with soaring food prices and shortages of basic staples in recent weeks, threatening to turn simmering discontent in the North African country — the cradle of the Arab Spring protests — into larger turmoil.

Sugar, vegetable oil, rice and even bottled water periodically disappear from supermarkets and grocery stores. People stand in line for hours for these food essentials that have long been subsidized and are now increasingly available in rations only. When they do appear on the shelves, many people cannot afford to pay the staggering price for them.

“I came to shop and found people fighting to buy and the prices were very high,” said shopper Amina Hamdi, 63, despairing at trying to buy basic goods.

“It is not possible to live without food,” said Aicha during a recent shopping trip to the fish and meat market in Tunis. “We can live without furniture, construction material, but we have to eat.” She only gave her first name for fear of persecution by police for speaking out.

The government has blamed speculators, black market hoarders and the war in Ukraine, but economic experts say the government’s own budget crisis, and its inability to negotiate a long-sought loan from the International Monetary Fund, have added to Tunisia’s troubles.

Fights sometimes break out at food market queues, and scattered protests and sporadic clashes with police over rising prices and shortages have occurred around the country. In a suburb of the capital, Tunis, a young itinerant fruit vendor recently killed himself after police seized the scales he used to weigh his wares.

His act of desperation revived memories of the 2010 self-immolation of another Tunisian vendor, Mohamed Bouazizi, which prompted protests that led to the ouster of long-time dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, and provoked similar uprisings around the Arab world.

The Ministry of Commerce promised last month that shortages would ease, announcing the import of 20,000 tons of sugar from India to be available in time for Mouled, the birthday of the Prophet Muhammad. But the night before the holiday, citizens formed long lines in front of supermarkets in the hope of getting a package of sugar, an essential food to prepare traditional dishes for the religious holiday.

Food isn’t the only thing in short supply. Lacking energy resources like those in neighboring Libya and Algeria, Tunisia relies heavily on imports, and its long-running economic troubles mean it has limited leverage on international markets to secure the goods it needs.

Inflation has reached a record rate of 9.1%, the highest in three decades, according to the National Institute of Statistics.

The Central Bank of Tunisia (BCT) added a hit by increasing bank fees and interest rates, hindering access to consumer loans.

In Douar Hicher, an impoverished suburb on the outskirts of Tunis considered a barometer of popular discontent, hundreds of people took to the streets at night last month to denounce the deterioration of their living conditions.

With cries of “work, freedom, dignity” — the flagship slogan of the 2010-2011 revolution — demonstrators blocked the town’s main artery by setting fire to tires, braving the police who sprayed tear gas to disperse them.

“Enough of speeches and promises, people are gripped by hunger and poverty,” read a banner erected by the demonstrators, their anger at the government and political elites palpable.

After sacking the prime minister and dissolving parliament, President Kaïs Saied has granted himself sweeping powers over the past year. He said the moves were necessary to save the country amid protracted political and economic crisis, and many Tunisians welcomed them, but critics and Western allies say the power grab jeopardizes Tunisia’s young democracy.

Saied attributes the scarcity of food products and the rise in prices to ”speculators” and those who hold a monopoly on goods they store in illegal depots. He suggested that his main political rivals, the Islamist movement Ennahdha, had some role, which the party firmly denies.

In a statement, the Salvation Front, a coalition of five opposition parties and several independent groups, called the demonstrations a sign of “a general explosion and the collapse of the social and political order.”

The general secretary of the powerful trade union UGTT, Noureddine Taboubi, blames the state’s overburdened budget.

The government is currently negotiating a $2 billion to $4 billion loan with the IMF to cope with a budget deficit aggravated by the COVID-19 pandemic and the fallout from Russia’s war in Ukraine. A high-ranking Tunisian delegation went to Washington on Saturday in the hope of finalizing a deal.

In return, Tunisia will have to commit to painful reforms, including shrinking the public administration sector — one of the world’s largest — which eats up about a third of the state budget. The IMF is also demanding the gradual lifting of subsidies and the privatization of state-owned enterprises, which implies massive layoffs and a worsening of unemployment, already at 18% according to the latest World Bank figures

Faced with such bleak prospects, Tunisians increasingly no longer hesitate to put their lives in danger to try to reach Europe in search of a better life.

The Tunisian Forum for Economic and Social Rights, an NGO that closely monitors migration, says 507 Tunisian migrants have died or gone missing so far in 2022 as they attempt the perilous crossing of the Mediterranean Sea.

According to National Guard spokesman Houssameddine Jebabli, the coast guard thwarted more than 1,500 attempts at illegal migration to Italy from January to September 2022, involving entire families including nearly 2,500 children.

Barbara Surk in Nice and Mehdi El-Arem in Tunis contributed.

Indigenous Coaches Lead Africa’s World Cup Campaign

Ghana Black Stars Coach Otto Addo

BY JUDE OBAFEMI

At the first-ever World Cup to be hosted on Arab soil, there is another unprecedented topic of near-equal significance especially for the African representation at football’s most prestigious event. When Morocco parted company with national team coach Vahid Halilhodzic last month, three months before the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, the country’s football federation (FRMF) said it was a decision reached because of internal disagreements on how to prepare the Atlas Lions for the Mondial. However, that decision created an opportunity to appoint a coach whose ideals aligned perfectly with the FRMF’s preparation strategies for the country’s senior men’s national football team. The Federation eventually settled for Walid Regragui, a former Moroccan international, who played as a defender for club and country, garnering no fewer than 46 caps during an active career that spanned 13 years. That decision to pick Regragui has historic significance for the African continent because it means that, for the first time, all five African representatives that have secured tickets for the quadrennial spectacle will be led by native, indigenous coaches.

THEWILL looks at the pedigree of these coaches, Walid Regragui of Morocco, Rigobert Song of Cameroon, Otto Addo of Ghana and Aliou Cisse of Senegal, all of whom played international football for their different countries, and Jalel Kadri, who will be in charge of Tunisia at the Qatar tournament to identify what they bring to their teams. Herein, it shall also be established what this significant occurrence means for the continent and the immeasurable benefits that will accrue to the continuous development of the local game if they are successful in carrying their teams to making exploits when hostilities kickoff in Group F for Morocco, Group G for Cameroon, Group H for Ghana, Group A for Senegal and Group D for Tunisia.

The choice of Regragui by the Moroccan Football Federation to manage the Atlas Lions at Qatar was a no-brainer for those conversant with football competitions on the continent. If there was confidence in any homegrown talents to improve on the coaching of Halilhodzic, the 46-year-old Regragui fitted the bill. He had the experience to organise a winning team through the rigours of an international competition and the marathon of a local league. The 69-year-old Halilhodzic who took charge of the North Africans in August 2019, led the Moroccan team to the quarter-finals of this year’s TotalEnergies Africa Cup of Nations in Cameroon and then secured World Cup qualification in March following a 5-2 aggregate win over DR Congo before the disagreements that led to the two parties amicably parting ways.

Regragui has the record to match the confidence reposed in his capacity to take this team progress to a level befitting their participation in Qatar. He was born on September 23, 1975 in Corbeil-Essonnes, France meaning he was eligible to represent Les Bleus but he elected to stick with his country of origin, Morocco. As a right-back, there was not much in terms of standout records from his playing career. In between representing the Moroccan national team, he was a player for Racing Santander, Toulouse, Grenoble, and AC Ajaccio. In the summer of 2009, Regragui transferred from Moroccan club Moghreb Tétouan to Grenoble for the last move of his active days as a player before making the switch to football management.

In September 2012, Regragui started working as an assistant football coach for Morocco’s national team. On October 1, 2013, Rachid Taoussi was fired as head coach, and, as assistant, Regragui’s contract was also terminated. He accepted a head coaching position at Fath Union Sport for the 2014/2015 season on May 8, 2014 and, by mutual accord, he left the team on January 22, 2020 after leading the team to life the Moroccan Throne Cup in the 2013/2014 season and the Botola Pro trophy in the 2015/2016 campaign. Regragui was named the Wydad AC head coach on August 10, 2021. He guided Wydad AC to its third CAF Champions League championship in May this year, defeating reigning champions and African football powerhouse Al Ahly in the final as only the second Moroccan manager to win the African Champions League after Hussein Ammouta’s triumph with Wydad in 2017. It is this winning mentality he hopes to incite in the team as they head to Qatar.

Alongside the Moroccans, Cameroon’s coach Song is no stranger to the high stakes of World Cup competitions, as he takes charge of their challenge for the title in November. Born July 1, 1976, he was a constant feature for the national team between 1993 and 2010 before transitioning to become coach of his country’s Under-23 national team. Renowned for his defensive prowess, he was irreplaceable in the defense line and participated in a record eight Africa Cup of Nations competitions, captained five of them (apart from South Africa 1996, Burkina Faso 1998, and Angola 2010) and holds the record for the most consecutive games played in the competition with 35 first team games. He was part of their triumphant teams at the 2000 and 2002 AFCON competitions, where his contributions were vital to their victories.

Professionally, Song started at Metz where he won the Coupe de la Ligue in 1996 before joining Salernitana, newly promoted to Serie A two years later. In 1999, he had successive stints with Liverpool, West Ham United and 1. FC Köln, but after failing to hold down a first-team place, he returned to France to play for Lens until 2004 when he moved to Turkey with Galatasaray to win two Süper Lig titles and the Turkish Cup. In 2008, he switched to Trabzonspor in 2008, won the Turkish Cup and stayed until 2010. Song is the only player, aside from Zinedine Zidane, to have been dismissed in two different World Cups, once against Brazil in 1994 and once against Chile in 1998. He was 17 years old when he become the youngest player ever to be dismissed from a World Cup. But, it is hoped that he will bring a solid disciplinary arc and indomitable winning mentality to the team going to Qatar.

In line with the theme of being born abroad but choosing to represent one’s country of origin, Ghana’s coach Addo was born on June 9, 1975 in Hamburg, West Germany. Playing as an attacking midfielder and winger, he spent all of his playing career in the German football scene with stints in clubs like VfL 93 Hamburg, Hannover 96, Borussia Dortmund, Mainz 05 and Hamburger SV, where he finished his active career. At the highpoint of his Bundesliga days, he won the 2001/2002 Bundesliga trophy with Dortmund, the club’s third in their history. He also turned up for the Black Stars of Ghana during the period for seven years beginning in 1999. In his debut, Ghana walloped Eritrea 5-0 in February 28, 1999. He rose to prominence on the global stage when he served as the nation’s captain during the 2000 AFCON.

In 2009, Addo began his coaching career with his old team, Hamburger SV first as a youth team coach and then, as assistant manager. Prior to the 2014 FIFA World Cup and the 2015 Africa Cup of Nations, Addo was appointed head scout of the Ghana national football team, succeeding Ibrahim Tanko. In April 2019, became “talent coach” for former side Dortmund after serving in a same capacity at Borussia Mönchengladbach. As an interim assistant to Edin Terzić, he won his first trophy as a coach after Dortmund defeated RB Leipzig in the finals of the 2020–21 DFB-Pokal. In February this year, he was made interim coach of the Black Stars and helped them qualify for Qatar on the away-goal rule against favourites Nigeria and will be hoping to give the Ghanaian team their best World Cup outing ever.

Of all the African coaches, Cisse is the oldest at the job who also played for the national team. The most recent recipient of the CAF award for best coach led the Senegalese team to their first ever victory at the AFCON in the Morocco-hosted edition to the jubilation of a grateful country. It was redemption for the coach who was born on March 24, 1976, as 20 years ago, when Cameroon defeated Senegal to win AFCON, Cisse missed the decisive penalty attempt in the shootout. But, the Teranga Lions recovered from that sad loss months later to shock France at the 2002 World Cup, defeating the tournament’s defending champions 1-0 in their opening match. They advanced quickly to the quarterfinals of the Korea/Japan event but were eliminated by Turkey through a “golden goal” in the final eight fixture.

Having played for Paris Saint-Germain between 1998 and 2002, Birmingham City and Portsmouth, in his active days, he in the defensive midfielder and occasionally as a centre back positions, he retired at Ligue 2’s Nîmes in 2009. He soon ventured into management and started off as the assistant coach of the U-23s in 2012 and 2013. Fortunately, in 2015, he replaced Frenchman Alain Giresse as the Teranga Lions coach after they crashed out of that year’s AFCON at the group stages and had gradually built the team to the level of champions that they finally attained this year and demonstrated when they beat Egypt again to pick the ticket to Qatar. He will be closely watched as Senegal look to improve on their world cup record this year.

Of the five indigenous coaches only Tunisia’s Kadri, born December 14, 1971, did not play football before taking up managerial duties. This possibly allowed him the luxury to have managed at no fewer than 20 teams in a coaching career spanning the years from 2001 to the present. With the experience coaching clubs as diverse as EGS Gafsa, Jendouba Sport, US Monastir, Al-Ansar FC, Al-Nahda Club, CA Bizertin, Emirates Club, Al Ahli Tripoli amongst others, his appointment as Tunisian coach still had the hand of good fortune with Nigeria’s Super Eagles playing a big role in the process. At the knockout stage of this year’s AFCON in January, Tunisia met Nigeria and Kadri had to replace the first coach, COVID-19 infected head coach Mondher Kebaier in leading the team. They beat Nigeria, regarded as the best team in the tournament, 1–0 to progress instead. By the end of January, he was made head coach and qualified Tunisia for Qatar with a 1-0 aggregate over two legs against Mali.

The five African coaches’ participation in the FIFA World Cup in Qatar is a significant step in the growth of African football. This is sufficient evidence that, when and if given the chance, local expertise can also work effectively. The entire world will have the chance to learn about the skills of African tacticians. The benefits are numerous, and one of them is that the money spent on the coaching staff will support economic growth in the nation. Furthermore, it means that, should they succeed in Qatar, they would offer a realistic model that other nations will be urged to use for the ongoing advancement of football on the continent.

SOURCE: THE WILL

IOM: Up To 600 Missing At Sea In 3 Months In Central Med

Dozens of migrants sit in a wooden boat adrift off the waters of Tunisia early Wednesday, May 25, 2022. Some 110 people were rescued by the non-governmental organization Open Arms during a mission in the Mediterranean Sea after their boat capsized. (AP Photo/Valeria Ferraro)

BY BOUAZZA BEN BOUAZZA

TUNIS, TUNISIA (AP) — The International Organization for Migration says up to 600 people attempting to reach Europe by sea from Tunisia and Libya have gone missing during the first three months of 2022, the highest figure since 2014.

In the latest tragedy, according to Tunisian authorities, a wooden boat carrying over 100 people capsized early Tuesday near the island of Kerkennah in southeastern Tunisia due to bad weather. The IOM said Wednesday that 30 people from that boat were rescued but 75 are still missing.

Tunisian navy and coast guard units continued to comb the area on Thursday where the tragedy occurred.

On Wednesday, dozens of migrants fell into the water as they struggled to cling to an upturned boat off the coast of Tunisia. Some 110 people were rescued by the non-governmental organization Open Arms.

Alice Sironi, head of migrant protection at the IOM, told The Associated Press that the central Mediterranean migration route, which runs between Libya and Tunisia across the sea, remains particularly deadly.

“In addition to our humanitarian role to take care of the survivors in terms of accommodation and food, we are committed to strengthening the capacities of the Tunisian authorities to come to the aid of boats in distress,” said Sironi.

According to Mourad Torki, a spokesperson for the courts of Sfax, the capital of the region, only one body has been recovered so far from Tuesday’s capsize, suggesting there is little hope of finding survivors.

“Generally, it takes several days for the corpses to be washed up by the sea,” Torki told the AP.

Scuffles At Protest Marking Tunisia’s 2011 Revolution

President Kais Saied of Tnisia

BY BOUAZZA BEN BOUAZZA AND MEHDI EL AREM

TUNIS, TINISIA (AP) — Protestors scuffled with police in Tunisia’s capital on Friday after crowds gathered, in defiance of new COVID-19 restrictions, to mark the 11th anniversary of the revolution that triggered the Arab Spring uprisings.

Police fired water cannon and tear gas at a crowd of several hundred in Tunis. Several protestors were arrested, while some were injured.

On Wednesday, the government re-imposed a nationwide nighttime curfew and announced a ban on public gatherings, citing a spike in coronavirus infections linked to the omicron variant.

Several politicians and civil society activists however have said that the decision was politically motivated, to prevent any commemorative demonstrations of the Jan. 14 anniversary, or anti-government protests.

Last July, Tunisian President Kais Saied abruptly dismissed the government and suspended parliament, taking on sweeping powers. His critics have called the measures a “coup d’etat,” and Saied’s subsequent consolidation of power has sparked large demonstrations both for and against him.

A host of new measures included his decision to move the nation’s official revolution day from Jan. 14 to Dec. 17, marking the date when a Tunisian fruit seller set himself alight in 2010, initially sparking the uprising that would inspire a series of movements in several countries that came to be known as the Arab Spring. In Tunisia, the popular movement led to the overthrow of the country’s long-term, autocratic ruler Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, who fled on the night of the 14th.

Saied has said that events following Jan. 14 led to the rise to power of “corrupt” politicians who “stole” the revolution.

“The new regime wants to erase this symbol (of Jan. 14) from the collective memory” said politician Issam Chebbi at a recent press conference ahead of the demonstration.

Despite the government’s ban on gatherings, several hundred demonstrators took to the streets of downtown Tunis but were prevented from entering the city’s main thoroughfare by a heavy police presence and barricades.

“Down with the coup” and “Kaïs you are a coward, the people will not be humiliated” were among the chants shouted by the demonstrators, referring to Saied’s power grab.

“We resisted the coup and we are still resisting it with civilized methods, despite the barbaric means that (Saied) uses against us. The citizens went to the streets empty-handed, unafraid of him” said one protestor at Friday’s demonstration, Ali, who did not wish to give his last name.

Another protestor, Sonia, said: “Why is there all this security presence that made the street look like a military barracks? (Is the government) afraid of us because of coronavirus? Why did the scientific committee choose this date to ban demonstrations?”

“It’s a lie like the one before, Mr. President, your lie is very clear today and it is proof that you are afraid. What we saw today is evidence of your fear” she said.

In September Saied partially suspended the country’s 2014 constitution and gave himself the power to rule by decree. Observers have since warned of democratic backsliding, while rights activists have condemned the arrests of several figures in recent months, including most recently the vice-president of Ennahdha — Tunisia’s largest Islamist party — and former justice minister, Noureddine Bhiri.

Saied announced a road map out of the country’s political crisis last month, starting with a partly-digital national consultation which that will launch Jan. 15. He has said that the consultation will inform the planning of a referendum on political reform, to be held in July, and subsequent parliamentary elections at the end of the year.

Celebration And Protests Mark Tunisia’s New Revolution Day

BYFRANCESCA EBEL 

An image of Mohammed Bouazizi is depicted on the facade of the post office building, in Sidi Bouzid, Tunisia, Friday, Dec. 17, 2021. President Kais Saied changed the anniversary date of Tunisia's 2011 revolution – when former autocratic ruler Zine el Abidine Ben Ali fled the country – to Dec. 17 to mark the day in 2010 when fruit seller Mohammed Bouazzi set himself alight, setting off the series of uprisings in Tunisia that led to what is now known as the Arab Spring.in Sidi Bouzid, Tunisia, Friday, Dec. 17, 2021. (AP Photo/Riadh Dridi)

TUNIS, TUNISIA (AP) — Official observances took place at the birthplace of Tunisia’s 2011 revolution, while opponents and supporters of the country’s president held rival demonstrations in the capital Friday, the new date the leader chose to mark Revolution Day.

A few hundred demonstrators gathered in Tunis on Friday morning to protest Tunisian President Kais Saied’s consolidation of power over the summer and his subsequent actions that have raised fears of democratic backsliding.

A smaller counter-protest in support of the president was held nearby.

Saied announced Monday, almost five months after his power grab, that he would prolong the suspension of parliament until an election in December next year. He also set a date for a national referendum on political reform for July 25, exactly a year since Saied took on sweeping powers.

The president’s opponents slammed his announcement.

Former parliament speaker Rached Ghannouchi, the leader of Tunisia’s largest Islamist party, Ennahdha, called Saied’s moves “unconstitutional and illegal” and said the president had “deepened the political crisis in the country…and exacerbated Tunisia’s international isolation.”

The secretary-general of the country’s main trade union, the UGTT, said Saied’s announcement did not address the country’s economic and social problems. The coronavirus pandemic exacerbated Tunisia’s deteriorating economy, and the country has an 18% unemployment rate.

Following nationwide antigovernment protests in July, Saied abruptly froze parliament, dismissed his government and assumed greater executive powers. In September, he partially suspended the country’s post-revolutionary Constitution and gave himself the power to rule by decree.

Though Saied’s measures have proven popular, welcomed by a public weary of political elites and economic turmoil, critics say Saied’s actions amount to a coup.

Among Saied’s recent announcements was his decision to move the country’s official Revolution Day from Jan. 14 – commemorating the date when former autocrat Zine el Abidine Ben Ali fled the country amid unprecedented mass protests – to Dec. 17.

The new date marks the day in 2010 when fruit seller Mohammed Bouazizi set himself on fire in frustration over corruption, joblessness and repression. His desperate act set off an uprising across Tunisia that spread to other countries in what became known as the Arab Spring.

In the decade since, an annual celebration has always been held on Dec. 17 in Sidi Bouzid, Bouazizi’s hometown and the site of the revolution’s first protests.

Tunisia Votes For President: Media Magnate Or Law Professor

People queue outside a polling station during the second round of the presidential election, in Tunis, Tunisia, Sunday, Oct. 13, 2019. Tunisians are voting for president, choosing between a law professor and populist tycoon. (AP Photo/Mosa'ab Elshamy)

BY BOUAZZA BEN BOUAZZA

TUNIS, TUNISIA (AP) — Tunisians are voting for president Sunday in an unusual contest pitting a populist tycoon who just got out of jail against a conservative professor backed by resurgent Islamists.

The winner of Sunday’s runoff vote will inherit a North African country struggling to create jobs, revive tourism and overcome sporadic extremist violence — but proud of its still-budding, post-Arab Spring democracy .

Voters lined up even before polls opened in the capital, Tunis, choosing between two candidates who have never held political office.

The top performer in last month’s first-round vote was 61-year-old Kais Saied, an enigmatic former constitutional law professor dubbed “Robocop” for his austere bearing.


His challenger is Nabil Karoui, a glib, 56-year-old media mogul who spent most of the campaign behind bars on accusations of money laundering and tax evasion that he calls politically driven.

The only thing the men have in common is their outsider status . Both rose to the runoff on the disenchantment of Tunisians, particularly young people and the poor, who feel the governing class hasn’t fulfilled the promises of the 2011 “jasmine revolution” that unleashed revolts around the Arab world.

“I just hope that everything that will happen in the next five years will be better for Tunisia,” said voter Elfi Zaouarda, casting a ballot in Tunis.

Saied is seen as the slight favorite, thanks to an enthusiastic youth campaign machine that cheers him on Twitter and backing from the No. 1 and No. 3 parties in the new parliament: the moderate Islamist party Ennahdha and the Al Karama Coalition, led by a radical Islamist lawyer.

More than 100,000 police, soldiers and security forces are guarding the 15,000 polling stations, notably on the borders with Libya and Algeria, and thousands of local and foreign observers are monitoring the vote.

Polling agencies are expected to release projections after voting stations close, and official results are expected Monday or Tuesday.

A well-heeled entrepreneur who just started his political party this year, Karoui campaigned on promises to fight poverty. Detractors dubbed him “Nabil Macaroni” because his party distributes the noodles to the poor.

He embraced it: “Nabil Macaroni, and proud to be,” Radio Mosaique quoted him as saying Friday.

During an unprecedented TV debate, Karoui promised to combat extremist violence by “attacking at its roots” and raising economic prospects in struggling provinces that are fertile recruiting grounds for the Islamic State group and other extremists.

A self-proclaimed modernist, he said he would seek partnerships with companies such as Microsoft, Google and Netflix to create jobs, and holds up women as pillars of society.

Saied, a conservative independent, has drawn in support with his Mr. Clean image and by promising to overhaul the “pyramid of power” to give poorer provinces and youth more decision-making power.

He sits poker-straight, his blank visage hiding any visible sign of emotion, and speaks in a staccato style — and in literary Arabic, a tongue inaccessible to many in Tunisia’s rural interior. Firmly conservative, he opposes equal inheritance rights for daughters and sons, arguing that the hot-button issue is decided by the Quran, the Muslim holy book.

Despite the backing of Ennahdha, he describes himself as politically neutral.

“I am independent and will remain so until the end of my life,” he said

Both men want Tunisia to work to bring peace to neighboring Libya.

For very different reasons, neither Karoui nor Saied has campaigned in a traditional way.

Saied let youthful supporters do much of the campaigning for him, while Karoui gave the job to his wife while he tried to get released from jail.

After their televised debate Friday, they cordially shook hands — a gesture Tunisians celebrated as a sign that their democracy is on the right track.

But whoever wins the presidency of Tunisia has tough challenges ahead leading this country of 11 million people. In addition to economic and security troubles, Tunisia is both a source of migrants trying to reach Europe and a transit country for migrant trafficking from elsewhere in Africa.

The new president will also have to work with a fractious parliament, the result of legislative elections on Oct. 6 that gave no party a clear majority.

This is only Tunisia’s second democratic presidential election, and is being held early following the July death in office of President Beji Caid Essebsi.

Elaine Ganley in Paris and Nadine Achoui-Lesage in Tunis contributed.

Arab League Rejects Trump's Israel Policies At Annual Summit

Arab leaders pose for the camera, ahead of the 30th Arab Summit in Tunis, Tunisia, Sunday, March 31, 2019. (Zoubeir Souissi, Pool photo via AP)

BY BOUAZZA BIN BOUAZZA & SAMY MAGDY

TUNIS, TUNISIA (AP) —The Arab League rejected the U.S. recognition of Israeli control over the Golan Heights and other Trump administration policies seen as unfairly biased toward Israel at an annual summit on Sunday, showcasing unity on one of the few issues that unites the regional bloc.

Arab leaders also reiterated their commitment to resolving the conflict based on the Arab Peace Initiative of 2002, in which they would recognize Israel in return for a full withdrawal from the Golan Heights as well as east Jerusalem and the West Bank, lands occupied in the 1967 war.

This year’s Arab League summit, held in Tunisia, comes against a grim backdrop of ongoing wars in Syria and Yemen, rival authorities in Libya and a lingering boycott of Qatar by four fellow League members.

Algeria’s President Abdelaziz Bouteflika and Sudan’s President Omar al-Bashir skipped the meeting as they contend with mass protests against their long reigns. Syria, a founding member, was expelled in 2011 during the early days of the uprising against President Bashar Assad.

Representatives from the 22-member league — minus Syria — jointly condemned President Donald Trump’s recognition of Israel’s annexation of the Golan Heights and his decision last year to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.

In their final statement after the daylong summit, the leaders affirmed that the Golan, a strategic plateau once used to shell northern Israel, is “Syria’s occupied territory.”

At the opening of the summit, King Salman said Saudi Arabia “absolutely rejects any measures undermining Syria’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights” and supports the creation of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, with east Jerusalem as its capital.

He added that Iran’s meddling was to blame for instability in the region. Saudi Arabia and Iran are locked in proxy wars in Yemen and Syria, and back opposing groups in Lebanon, Bahrain and Iraq.

Calling the meeting “the summit of resolve and solidarity,” Host-country Tunisia’s President Beji Caid Essebsi decried “regional and international interventions” in Arab affairs.

Arab League Secretary-General Ahmed Aboul-Gheit said Iran and Turkey have “worsened some crises and created new problems,” calling on Arab leaders to “unite as one force under one umbrella against the regional interventions.”

“There is no room for any regional power to have pockets within our countries, namely for example ‘safe zones,’” Aboul-Gheit said. He was apparently referring to Turkey’s proposal to create a no-fly zone in northern Syria to protect Syrian opposition forces from Assad’s air force.

One of the few things that have united the Arab League over the last 50 years is the rejection of Israel’s occupation of the Golan Heights as well as east Jerusalem and the West Bank, territories that the Palestinians want for their future state.

The international community, including the United States, largely shared that position until Trump upended decades of U.S. policy by moving the American Embassy to Jerusalem last year and recognizing Israel’s 1981 annexation of the Golan earlier this month. U.S. officials say both moves recognize reality on the ground and contribute to Israel’s security.

The Arab leaders meeting in Tunisia condemned those policies but did not announce any further action.

That’s in part because regional powerhouses Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have cultivated close ties with the Trump administration, viewing it as a key ally against their main rival, Iran. Both face Western pressure over their devastating three-year war with Yemen’s Houthi rebels, and Riyadh is still grappling with the fallout from the killing of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi agents last year.

In Syria, small protests against Trump’s Golan move were held and state media criticized the Arab summit. “The Golan is not awaiting support from the Arabs, and not a statement to condemn what Trump has done,” the Thawra newspaper said in an editorial that accused Arab leaders of taking their orders from the U.S. and Israel.

The Arab League had been expected to consider readmitting Syria, but there was no reference to the subject in the final statement.

The United Arab Emirates reopened its embassy in Damascus last year, and other Arab states have voiced support for restoring relations. But Saudi Arabia and Qatar have actively supported the rebels trying to overthrow Assad, and other states view his government as an Iranian proxy that should continue to be shunned.

Some countries were represented by their heads of state on Sunday, while others sent lower-level delegations. The UAE sent the lesser-known Fujairah ruler Hamad bin Mohammed al-Sharqi rather than the powerful Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed or Dubai’s ruler, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres attended the meeting, along with EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini and African Union Commission chair Moussa Faki.

Guterres reiterated international support for an Israeli and a Palestinian state “living side by side in peace within secure and recognized borders, and with Jerusalem as capital of both states.”

“There is no Plan B: without two states, there is no solution,” he said.

In a rare sign of easing tensions, King Salman and Qatar’s emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, sat at the same sprawling table at Sunday’s opening session. It was the first time the two leaders have appeared in the same room since Saudi Arabia led the boycott of Qatar nearly two years ago over Doha’s ties to Iran and its support for regional Islamist groups.

But Qatar’s emir left the summit after the opening session and did not address the summit or attend the closed-door meeting later in the day, according to Qatar’s state-run news agency, which did not give a reason for his early departure. Footage circulating online showed Tamim left the meeting as the Arab League chief, Aboul-Gheit, was addressing the summit.

Magdy reported from Cairo. Associated Press writer Sarah El Deeb in Beirut contributed to this report.

Tunisia Tries To Defuse Tension With UAE Amid Airline Spat

Tunisian women stage a protest near the United Arab Emirates' embassy in Tunis, Tunisia, Monday Dec. 25, 2017. Tunisia has suspended all flights by Emirates to and from Tunis after the Dubai-based airline barred Tunisian women from boarding its flights last week.

TUNIS, TUNISIA (AP) — Tunisia tried to smooth out emerging tensions with the United Arab Emirates on Monday after Emirates airline barred Tunisian women from boarding its flights and the North African country responded by suspending the Dubai-based carrier's operations in the air and on the ground.

The spokeswoman for the Tunisian presidency dismissed any notion of a "diplomatic crisis" between the two countries, expressing Tunisia's "understanding" of a decision made by the UAE's government to "protect its territory and its airlines."

After the Emirates' decision caused an outcry in Tunisia, the presidential spokeswoman had to speak publicly on a radio station to explain that the ban targeting Tunisian women followed alleged serious threats of attacks.

The spokeswoman, Saïda Garrach, said the UAE's authorities explained that they made the decision following "serious security information" about alleged plans for attacks by Tunisian women, or women with Tunisian passports, from "tense hotbeds" in Syria and Iraq.

UAE Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Anwar Gargash tweeted that the ban was temporary and due to security reasons. In a later written statement, Tunisian President Beji Caid Essebsi "called for overcoming these problems as soon as possible to preserve the relations of brotherhood and cooperation between the two peoples of Tunisia and UAE."

But Caid Essebsi said Tunisia will maintain the suspension of all flights by Emirates to and from Tunis until the UAE's government reconsiders its ban. He stressed the need to preserve the dignity of all Tunisian citizens in the country and abroad and to protect the rights of Tunisian women in all circumstances.

Tunisia summoned UAE's ambassador on Friday following Emirates' ban. Speaking on Shems FM radio, Garrach, the Tunisian presidential spokeswoman, said the UAE decided on the targeted ban "swiftly, without notifying the Tunisian authorities and even their own ambassador in Tunis," given the "seriousness" of the information they held. While "understanding" the Emirati move, she said the way the UAE proceeded was "unacceptable" and required a "quick reaction" from Tunis.

In an apparent attempt to ease Tunisians' discontent, Gargash, the Emirati minister of state, tweeted that the UAE values Tunisian women and their "exemplary empowerment." The barring of Tunisian women has caused anger among rights groups and political parties in Tunisia. In a joint statement, three rights groups described the UAE's move as "a violation of the basic rights of Tunisian women and agreements on the free movement of people."

A small protest was held outside the UAE Embassy in Tunis in the afternoon. Protesters called the decision "discriminatory" and "a humiliation to Tunisian women." Since Friday, several Tunisian women have been barred from boarding Emirates flights in Tunis, Abu Dhabi and Beirut.

Tunisia Obtains Observer Status Of West African Bloc

TUNIS, NOV.  20 (XINHUA) -- Tunisia has just obtained observer status in the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), Tunisian Foreign Minister Khemais Jhinaoui told reporters here on Monday.

Jhinaoui also announced the signing of an agreement protocol with the West African intergovernmental organization to put in place an economic roadmap between Tunisia and this African body.

The protocol requires the implementation of an action plan that defines the sectors involved in this multilateral economic partnership, including agriculture, trade and development.

"For the moment, Tunisia will take part, as an observer, in the next meeting of this community scheduled for November in Togo," said Jhinaoui.

Cooperation between Tunisia and the organization will be crowned by the creation of a free trade zone between Tunisia and ECOWAS member states, the minister said.

Currently, Tunisia's trade with these countries accounts for only 1 percent of its total trade, according to Tunisian Minister of Commerce Omar Behia. The rate is aimed to rise to 10 percent.

"Bringing together 15 countries, the Economic Community of West African Countries guarantees the transportation of goods and the free movement of people between member states," said Marcel De Souza, president of the ECOWAS Commission.

He noted the continental organization includes eight central banks, saying one of his ambitions is to create a single currency by 2020.

Tunisians Skeptical On Eve Of Historic Election

Tunisian soldiers celebrate at the end of a successful raid against gunmen in the Oued Ellil suburb of Tunis, Tunisia, Friday, Oct. 24, 2014

TUNIS, TUNISIA (AP) — In a raucous cafe in a Tunis slum, men talked in loud voices and paid little attention to the politicians debating on the television mounted on the wall. Qais Jebali swiftly made espressos behind the bar and explained why no one in the gritty neighborhood of Tadamon cared about the upcoming elections.

"We've had five governments since 2011 and nothing has changed on the ground," he said, arranging the cups of strong black coffee on a tray with a bowl of sugar. "The poor people don't trust the government because they are marginalized, harassed by police and don't have money to pay bribes."

Outside, members of the National Guard in bullet-proof vests and carrying assault rifles waved cars through a dilapidated traffic circle. Security was heightened because a standoff with suspected militants was taking place just a few kilometers away.

On Sunday, Tunisians will vote for their first five-year parliament since they overthrew dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, marking the end of the democratic transition that they alone among the pro-democracy Arab Spring uprisings have managed to achieve. Now, many Tunisians are expressing disillusionment over democracy.

They say it has not brought prosperity and seems largely to involve squabbling politicians and attacks by Islamic militants, raising fears that many may not turn out to vote in a country that has been described as the best chance for democracy in the Arab world.

"There is a depression after these three years of seeing rulers lying, not keeping their word, not doing or not even trying to do what they promised to do, and especially, in the midst of a dire economic situation," said Chawki Gaddes, a political analyst at Tunis University.

In 2011, the moderate Islamist Ennahda Party dominated elections and formed a coalition government with two secular parties. Over the next two years, the country was buffeted by punishing inflation, attacks by radical Islamists, assassinations and the daily spectacle of squabbling politicians in a country accustomed to a half century of one-party rule.

As the government and opposition deadlocked amid the rising political acrimony — and against the backdrop of a military coup against the Islamist government in nearby Egypt — the Islamist-led government stepped down at the end of 2013 in favor of new cabinet of technocrats.

Polling from the Pew Research center in Tunisia has seen support for democracy as the best form of government drop from 63 percent in 2012 to 48 percent, while the demand for a strong leader rose from 37 percent to 59 percent.

The disaffection is particularly strong among young people, the group that so spectacularly took to the streets to fight Ben Ali's riot police and force him out of power three years ago. In the neighborhoods like Tadamon, it's difficult to find any young people registered to vote. According to Mouheb Garoui of the election monitoring group I Watch, some 60 percent are undecided just days before the election.

"There were so many promises in 2011 and now the same promises are being made in 2014," he said. "There is discontent and apathy among youth." The Islamist-led government managed to lay down many of building blocks of a new political system and, together with the opposition, write a constitution described as one of the most progressive in the region. Yet the turmoil and deadlock kept away foreign aid, tourism and investment.

"The question of the economy was neglected in the three years of the revolution — it was years of political wrangling and political transition," Prime Minister Mehdi Jomaa, the interim prime minister that succeeded the Islamist government, told The Associated Press. He says his administration, which succeeded the Islamist government, has begun the necessary economic reforms to stabilize the country. Under his watch, foreign aid has flowed back to the country.

In the past year, security forces have also carried out a string of attacks to dismantle suspected militant cells, most recently on Friday when a counterterrorism operation in the suburbs resulted in the deaths of six alleged militants — five of them gun-toting women, according to police.

The party most hoping to capitalize on voters' disaffection is Nida Tunis (Tunisia's Call) run by charismatic — albeit 87-year-old — politician Beji Caid Essebsi, who is clearly trying to evoke the good old days of an educated, modern Tunisia without the dictatorship.

Formed after the revolution, the party brings together trade unionists, businessmen and more than a few politicians from Ben Ali's time that are united by little more than opposition to the Islamists. The main message of their campaign has been that their party represents progress in the face of what they call the reactionary policies of Ennahda.

"We needed a party to bring back the middle class that was pushed to the side by the aggression of the Islamists and their beliefs," said Mustapha Ben Ahmed, a member of the party's executive bureau. "This historical bloc can restore the prestige of the state."

The party is probably the only one that can compete with Ennahda's impressive organization around the country and is running equal in polls. Wwith the anti-Islamist vote divided among many parties all promising jobs and stability, Ennahda likely will have to be part of any future coalition — a possibility Ben Ahmed fervently condemned as an "unnatural alliance."

The leader of Ennahda, however, has said his party is ready to make a coalition with whomever else the voters choose, though Nida Tunis would not be his first choice. Rachid Ghannouchi told AP that the lesson he has learned from the party's first experience in power was the need for an even broader-based coalition to carry out the difficult reforms need to get the country on track.

"Before when we came to power we were just activists and not statesmen but today we have both activists and statesmen," he said. "We have gained experience and become more realistic with a better understanding of the problems of the people."

At a massive Ennahda rally in the heart of downtown on the iconic Bourguiba Avenue on the eve of the election, thousands cheered and waved flags, showing none of the flagging enthusiasm for politics found elsewhere.

For supporters of the party, any past missteps are made up for by the belief that the Islamists have their best interests at heart. "They were learning," said Kamal Ali as he drove his car through downtown. "Do children on the first day of school already know how to read and write?"

He gestured at the still damaged husk of the old ruling party headquarters nearby. "The others they knew how to do politics, but they also knew how to steal — morals is the most important thing."

Associated Press writers Bouazza ben Bouazza and Sam Kimball contributed to this report.

Police Brutality Claims Shadow Tunisia Elections

Tunisian women demonstrate outside a courthouse where three police officers face charges of rape of a 27-year-old woman, in Tunis, Tunisia. 

TUNIS, TUNISIA (AP) — When Mohammed Ali Snoussi was arrested last month in Tunis, witnesses say, police beat him with truncheons, stripped him naked and threatened to rape him in broad daylight.

The Interior Ministry said Snoussi was wanted for drug possession, trafficking and assaulting police. He lasted six days in police detention cells, before he was transferred to a hospital where he died in a coma, his body covered in bruises.

Nearly four years after an uprising fueled largely by anger over police brutality overthrew one of the most repressive states in the region, ordinary Tunisians say daily abuses by security forces remain a major problem in the country. On Sunday, Tunisians are set to vote in parliamentary elections that will nearly complete the democratic transition begun by the revolution, but many fear the brutal ways of the former regime are creeping back — and in fact may never have gone away.

According to Human Rights Watch, police regularly abuse detainees in prison and pre-trial detention facilities, denying them access to legal counsel and holding them in filthy, overcrowded cells. In a survey of 100 detainees awaiting charges, the organization found that 30 percent said they had been subject to physical abuse including electric shocks, in order to extract confessions or evidence.

"I think we can say with confidence that practices of police abuse never stopped," said Amna Guellali, Human Rights Watch's Tunisian representative. Those bearing the brunt of the police violence are ordinary, lower income Tunisians living in poor neighborhoods regularly targeted under harsh drug possession laws, which mandate at least a year in prison for carrying drugs, said the rights group.

Much like pre-revolution times, they face nighttime house raids and constant neighborhood sweeps, followed by abuse in the police stations, with little recourse to justice, activists say. Tunisia's police have long treated the poor harshly, and the Arab Spring upheavals were in fact set off when an itinerant fruit vendor set himself on fire in protest against police abuse.

Tunisian Interior Minister Lotfi Ben Jeddou admitted there are abuses in prison, but strongly denied systematic torture of detainees. In a radio interview this month, he said Snoussi died of drug use which caused a lung infection that spread to his heart. He said a prosecutor and an investigator found no traces of police beating him.

"The autopsy is clear. It is not logical that after the revolution we would hide the truth," he said. "You can't assign security forces responsibility for a natural death, as was the case." In the immediate aftermath of the revolution, most security forces withdrew from the streets of Tunisia in the face of the widespread outrage against President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali's police state. But the rise of extremist groups during the ensuing social instability has led to their rehabilitation.

In the past few years, Islamic radicals went from publicly demonstrating for greater piety to attacking people. Two left-wing politicians were gunned down in 2013 and dozens of soldiers were killed in attacks in remote border regions, causing people to clamor for greater security.

According to critics, however, terrorism is being used as an excuse to let the police literally get away with murder — with ordinary people rather than extremists or government opponents the most common targets.

In August, security services in the southern city of Kasserine opened fire on a car travelling home from a wedding, killing two young women. Violent protests broke out in the city, demanding prosecution of the officers involved.

But Kasserine is near Mount Chaambi on the Algerian border, which is believed to be the hideout for a group of al-Qaida-linked militants. The Interior Ministry maintained the officers were only defending themselves, and no one was prosecuted.

During the time of Ben Ali, the Interior Ministry was notorious for using the threat of sexual violence to intimidate female activists and for launching smear campaigns against government opponents. Sabra Badbabis, a 25 year-old human rights activist and blogger in Tunis, said the behavior continues. She described how she recently left work at a call center around midnight to find herself accosted by two men who turned out to be plainclothes policemen.

"They grabbed me and pulled my arms back and pushed my head down," she said. "Don't say you're a respectable woman," she recalled them telling her. "You went out at this time of night. Whatever happens to you is your fault."

She said she was taken the police station, where she was insulted and propositioned. She said she was only released after she threatened to make the incident public on her blog. The Association Against Torture in Tunisia wants to persuade the new crop of lawmakers who emerge from the election to take measures against police violations. The group's general secretary, Mondher Cherni, said the goal is to pressure the newly elected politicians to carry out real reform of security services and detention centers.

Cherni says police brutality is alienating whole sections of Tunisian society from the nation's democratic transition. "The people feel that the state doesn't look after them," he said, "because it's not stopping this."