Tunisia – Awatif Al Suwaidi

The case of the assassination of leaders Chokri Belaid and Mohamed Brahmi represents one of the important issues on two contextual levels in Tunisia, the first of which is political justice and the second is criminal justice, which is supposed to reach a final ruling that makes the parties, whether individuals or entities directly involved, known and not covered up, and even not blinded. Other roles of the rulers of the political scene in that period, which became known as the Black Decade, led by the “Renaissance Movement.”

Although the “Ennahda Movement” appears in all cases to be facing political responsibility, despite the accusations against extremist Salafist groups and their involvement in the assassination of leaders, the defense team for the leaders Belaid and Brahmi revealed a remarkable issue in a previous period related to suspicious attempts to politicize the judiciary and even destroy and destroy some evidence in the case. Cases affecting state security, and a member of the defense team, Kathir Bouallaq, said that the defense team filed a criminal complaint against all the judges who received the “Secret Service” file because they were involved in preventing the truth from being revealed and access to the judiciary.

What the Defense Committee for the leaders Belaid and Brahmi indicated intersects with the crisis of politicization of the judiciary during the period of rule of the “Ennahda Movement,” specifically in the period between 2013 and 2014, which witnessed the elevation of one of its leaders, Noureddine El-Behairi, to the position of the Ministry of Justice in the “Troika” government, and some practices and movements emerged that Some considered it to undermine the course of justice or put pressure on its independence in terms of controlling the judicial system. The Tunisian judge, who previously assumed the presidency of the Tunisian Judges Association, Kalkoum Kanno, had criticized the minister in the “Troika” government and said that he “carried out a judicial movement on his own and on his own terms under the pretext of inaugurating the Supreme Judicial Council, and Ennahdha relied in its approach on a policy of procrastination in order to avoid establishing a temporary judicial body.” “The Justice.”

The Tunisian judge hinted that the minister, who belongs to the Islamist movement, appointed a group of people affiliated with “Ennahda” “and others related to suspicions and files of corruption in decision-making sites, the most important of which are the courts of the capital, Tunis, which consider cases of the political and legal dimension.”

In addition, after eleven years of faltering, the trial of those accused of the assassination of the martyr Chokri Belaid, a lawyer and leader in the “Unified Democratic Patriots Party,” a Tunisian leftist party, began in Tunisia. It is expected that the interrogation sessions of the defendants in the Belaid assassination case, which began on February 6, 2024, will end today, amid calls for the necessity of these sessions to be public and in the presence of journalists and media outlets.

While the lawyer and member of Chokri Belaid’s defense team, Iman Qazzara, expected that today’s session, Friday, would be the last interrogation session for the accused, to later make way for the lawyers to present their arguments.

The assassination of Belaid and Brahmi is a turning point in Tunisia’s history

The assassination was carried out by firing squad on February 6, 2013. In December 2014, the terrorist organization ISIS claimed responsibility for the assassination of the leaders of the Popular Front, Chokri Belaid and Hajj Mohamed Brahmi.

The interrogation sessions for the accused include 23 defendants, including those on release and others detained on charges of “premeditated murder, incitement to commit terrorist crimes, joining groups related to a terrorist organization, collecting donations to finance people connected to terrorist activities, and providing weapons and explosives for the benefit of a related organization.” with terrorist crimes.”

The assassination file is still ongoing, given that there are other open investigations into those who planned and planned and those who protected them at the political and judicial levels, as the Shukri Belaid file has a close relationship with other files, including the file of the “Black Room of the Ministry of Interior” and the file of the “Secret Service.”

The assassination of Belaid, and then Brahmi in the same year 2013, represented a turning point in the history of Tunisia, as the assassinations contributed to the emergence of a political crisis in the country that changed the course of governance and ended with changing the coalition government consisting of the “troika” Ennahdha, Congress and Ettakatol parties, and replacing it with a government of independents and holding legislative elections. Presidential in 2014.

Abdelmadjid Belaid (Shoukri’s brother) considered that the measures of Tunisian President Kais Saied “restored hope in revealing the truth about the assassination of the two martyrs, Shukri Belaid and Mohamed Brahmi. Before that, we had no confidence in the judiciary, given that the file was tampered with and was deliberately dismantled.”

Belaid’s “Unified Democratic Patriots” party and its defense body, the “Ennahdha Movement,” accuse it of being behind the assassination of Belaid, and holds it politically and morally responsible, a matter that Ennahdha has repeatedly denied, considering it to be the party most affected by the crime of assassination by relinquishing power and rule in 2013, claiming that “These accusations are merely political exploitation of the issue without evidence, and incitement of sedition with the aim of overthrowing the path of democratic transition.”

The leader of the United Democratic Patriots Party, Monji Al-Rahwi, explains the disruption of the case due to the presence of political arms that have penetrated the state apparatus, including the judiciary, which explains the failure to advance the case of the assassination of the two martyrs and reveal the full truth.

He continued by saying, “But today something has changed, and the Public Prosecutor, who was present and perched on the progress of such cases and had a role in dismantling this case and covering up the truth, is no longer present today.”

One of the reasons for delaying the court until today is the state of the judicial facility, which suffers from the absence of human and logistical capabilities in the judiciary, in addition to the control of the “Ennahdha Movement” over the judiciary after the revolution.

Member of the Belaid Defense Committee, Iman Qazzara, told Al-Hal Net

In a statement dated February 8, the “Ennahdha Movement” called for a public trial in the case of the assassinations that took place in Tunisia and for it to be broadcast live to reveal the truth before the Tunisian people, renewing its keenness to reveal the full truth about the assassination of Chokri Belaid.

Put an end to manipulation

Today, observers confirm that the course of the case is close to being resolved, as the Dean of Lawyers, Hatem Maziou, praised the start of the trial after 11 years of waiting, indicating that this is positive for justice and for Tunisia in general.

In this regard, lawyer Abdel Nasser Al-Aouini, a member of the defense committee for Shukri Belaid, confirmed that the body believes that it has 70 percent of the facts related to Belaid’s assassination, while work continues to uncover the rest of the facts, which will be presented successively to the judiciary.

Al-Awaini explained during a press conference held recently by the Commission that the latter is currently dealing with the judiciary without political barriers and without hiding the files and facts that were recorded during the last period, describing the interrogation of the accused during the pleading sessions two weeks ago as the beginning of the interrogation of the truth in this case.

Al-Awaini stressed that the Commission had prepared with the necessary files, documents and arguments for the interrogation sessions of the accused.

The intersection of political and judicial time

Regarding the absence of judicial restrictions and difficulties that accompanied the Belaid case file, a member of the defense team representing Shukri Belaid says that the case witnessed a major disruption and continued for more than 11 years. Complaints were filed more than a year ago and the judicial stops are still ongoing.

Iman Qazzara added in a statement to “Al-Hal Net” website, that the defense team’s battle was mainly with the Public Prosecution, which was reluctant to consider the complaints, and one of the reasons for the obstruction, according to its assessment, was the condition of the judicial facility, which suffers from the absence of human and logistical capabilities in the judiciary, in addition to the control of “ Ennahda Movement” on the judiciary after the revolution.

Regarding Ennahda’s responsibility for this assassination, Qazzara reported that the Defense Authority had complained about leaders in this party since 2018, most notably Kamal Al-Badawi, Kamal Al-Aifi, and Mustafa Khidr. Research continues with Al-Taher Al-Boubakri, an advisor to Ali Al-Arayedh, confirming that there are charges officially brought against them related to joining a terrorist organization that leads to a terrorist alliance and then to assassination.

In her exclusive interview with Al-Hal Net, Qazzara stressed that the interrogation of the 23 defendants will end today, Friday, and that the pleadings will begin next Tuesday, expecting that at the end of this February or the beginning of March, the preliminary ruling will be issued against the implementation group. .

Hypotheses for dissolving the “Ennahda Movement”

On the other hand, supporters of the “Ennahdha Movement” warn against the hypothesis of using Belaid’s assassination to settle scores with this party. In this context, the journalist and expert in strategic studies, Kamal Ben Younes, explains that “contrary to what is being circulated about the martyrs Shukri Belaid and Mohamed Brahmi, they were not among the symbols of the extreme and exclusionary left,” despite their sharp criticism of their opponents, including within the (nationalist leftist) Popular Front” and in the coalition. The ruling trio at the time, and the leaders of the Ennahdha, Congress, and Ettakatol parties, especially Rashed Ghannouchi, Moncef Marzouki, and Mustafa Ben Jaafar, and the symbols of the “extremist Salafist movement” in the “Ansar al-Sharia,” “Al-Qaeda,” and “ISIS” organizations.

Kamal Ben Younes continued in his interview with Al-Hal Net, “The lengthy judicial and security investigations in which Western intelligence participated during the era of President Beji Caid Essebsi proved that most of the perpetrators of the two assassinations were among the extremist Salafists affiliated with the Ansar al-Sharia organization, which was classified by the security and political authorities in Tunisia.” A terrorist organization since mid-2013.”

Ben Younis points out that, according to what was stated in the decisions to conclude the investigations and the indictment chamber, most of those accused of planning and organizing belong to “extremist Salafist” groups close to “Ansar al-Sharia.” On the other hand, lawyers from Chokri Belaid’s defense team believe that leaders in the “Ennahda Party” and the “Troika” government bear political responsibility for the assassination and announced that they will file other cases to try to convict leaders from Ennahdha and its “secret wing,” so that all scenarios remain possible.

Observers believe that the case will have political repercussions if the judiciary proves the involvement of elements of the Ennahda Movement. Regarding this, Ben Younis believes that “Ennahdha’s leaders and partners in governance during the 2012-2021 decade have become marginalized in the current political scene and have weakened greatly since the turning point of July 25, 2021. At the same time, the political and party fronts that previously accused them of involvement in the crimes of Belaid and Brahmi’s assassinations have fractured.” Therefore, I do not expect that the mutual media campaigns on the sidelines of the trials will succeed in exploiting the case again to attack the Ennahdha Party and its former political partners, nor in reuniting the left into a new popular front capable of influencing the new political scene or the upcoming electoral path.”

Regarding the political and moral responsibility of Ennahdha in the Belaid case, Kamal Ben Younes considers that the conviction of political figures from the parties that ruled in the 2012-2021 decade, especially some leaders of the Ennahdha and Congress parties led by Rached Ghannouchi and Moncef Marzouki, is contingent on the disclosure of the Public Prosecution and Security files. He stated, “Currently, everything that has been revealed basically condemns extremist Salafist organizations.”

On the other hand, the journalist believes that holding the “Troika” government politically responsible for the “invasion” of the Salafists and for the violence practiced by groups and personalities among them, especially those who trained with weapons in “hotspots of tension,” such as Libya, Syria, and Iraq, and then returned to Tunisia to commit terrorist crimes. It is logical, because the responsibility in this case is essentially political, and accusations may be directed at most of the major political and union leaders who have taken power since January 2011.

It is expected that these judicial rulings will take some time, as they will go through the stages of appeal and comment, but they will open the door to repercussions, whether on the “Ennahdha Movement” or on the political scene as a whole.