H.E. Zine El Abidine Ben Ali
President
Office of the President
Palais de Carthage
2016 Carthage
Republic of Tunisia
Fax: (011.216.1) 73.19.99
Your Excellency:
We write to protest your country@quot;s part in the continuing world-wide abuse of press freedom.
On this day, World Press Freedom Day, there are to — the best of our knowledge –193 journalists imprisoned in the jails of 29 countries, most of them solely for having done their jobs. Tunisia is one of the 29, and we are informed that you have two journalists in custody.
Hamadi Jebali, editor of the now-defunct weekly, Al-Fajr , has been in prison since 1991 — thirteen years. He was originally convicted of defamation, but then was accused of participating in a conspiracy to overthrow the government and sentenced to an additional sixteen years. He claims to have been tortured while in prison. After a hunger strike and his transfer to a hospital in February, 2003, he has not been heard from. Abdullah Zouari, also with Al-Fajr, was sentenced last year to 13 months in prison on two charges: violating administrative controls and defamation. The administrative controls were imposed after his release from an earlier 11-year jail term for belonging to the banned Islamic Al-Nahda party. To protest worsening prison conditions, he began a hunger strike in February, 2004. His family reports that he is in seriously weakened physical and mental state.
Your Excellency, these prisoners should be released both on principle and as a matter of expediency. The principle is simple, as stated in the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights. “”Everyone,? according to the Declaration, ?has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.”” U.N. members recognize that this right is sometimes inconvenient and troublesome. Yet, it is crucial to uphold, and for practical reasons: A nation that stifles freedom of thought and expression forfeits the good opinion of the world and isolates itself. This may prompt political or economic sanctions, with loss of diplomatic influence and domestic prosperity; at the least, it relegates a country to the company of North Korea, Iraq under Saddam Hussein, or Zimbabwe. And in long or short order, a repressive regime will be overturned.
The Overseas Press Club of America, an independent organization that has defended press freedom around the world for 65 years, urges you to re-think your policy, to welcome free expression of ideas and opinions, and to release Hamadi Jebali and Abdullah Zouari.
The courtesy of a reply would be appreciated.
Respectfully yours,
Larry Martz
Norman A. Schorr
Co-chairmen, Freedom of the Press Committee