Tunisian activist sentenced to prison for criticizing police

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“I don’t know if I should laugh, get angry, or be totally frustrated,” Myriam Bribri, a Tunisian activist, told Human Rights Watch in response to the fine and four-month prison sentence that she received. a court in the city of Sfax imposed on him. December 21, 2021. Bribri had posted a video on his Facebook page in October 2020 showing police brutally arresting a man, along with the comment: “You are all big assholes.

Sfax police officers questioned Bribri about the video and his commentary on October 8, 2020. On the same day, a prosecutor charged Bribri with “knowingly harming or disturbing others via public telecommunications networks”, under of Article 86 of the Tunisian Telecommunications Code of 2001, the charge for which she was convicted last month. She remains provisionally free pending her appeal.

Bribri has participated in a number of protests over the years, particularly those organized by groups representing those injured or killed in the 2011 revolution, who continue to demand redress and justice.

Bribri was also active in the “Manich Msamah” (“I will not forgive”) movement, which unsuccessfully opposed the adoption of a 2017 law providing, in the name of reconciliation, amnesty for state employees who served under ousted President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali and who were not implicated in serious human rights abuses.

It’s unclear whether authorities prosecuted Bribri in retaliation for her activism, while leaving many other people alone who posted comments like hers in reaction to the same video. But Bribri joins dozens of other Tunisians, including bloggers, activists and social media commentators who have been prosecuted for their peaceful criticism of state officials and institutions, even though that criticism is nothing short of more than a sarcastic or profane exclamation.

Repressive laws that date back to the pre-revolutionary period are alive and well in Tunisia. But the same goes for activists like Myriam Bribri, who swears that these laws and the authorities imposing them will not silence her.

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