A Tunisian court frees NGO workers with suspended sentences for aiding migrants, ending a case that drew international criticism over migrant rights.
TUNIS: A Tunisian court has freed a group of humanitarian workers after handing them suspended sentences for facilitating the “illegal entry and residence” of migrants.
Sherifa Riahi, the former director of the French NGO Terre d’Asile, and several staff members had already spent more than 20 months in jail before their final hearing.
Hours after the hearing, Riahi’s support committee posted a video of her leaving prison overnight, announcing her colleagues had also been freed.
Defence lawyer Mahmoud Daoud Yaacoub told AFP the court gave a two-year suspended sentence to defendants who were in pre-trial detention.
He added they would learn the judgment for defendants out on bail the following day.
The NGO employees were accused alongside 17 municipal workers from Sousse who were implicated for lending premises to the organisation.
The 23 defendants, also charged with “conspiracy”, had faced up to 10 years in prison.
Other charges, including ones alleging financial misdeeds, were previously dropped.
The defendants’ lawyers argued they were simply carrying out humanitarian work under a state-approved programme, in coordination with the government.
A handful of people gathered outside the courthouse in support of the defendants on the trial’s final day.
The final hearing lasted all day before the court retired to consider the verdict.
The UN special rapporteur for human rights defenders, Mary Lawlor, had urged authorities to release Riahi instead of trying her on “dubious charges”.
Migration is a sensitive issue in Tunisia, a key transit point for tens of thousands seeking to reach Europe each year.
The defendants were arrested in May 2024 along with about a dozen humanitarian workers, including anti-racism pioneer Saadia Mosbah.
Mosbah’s trial is to start later this month.
In February 2023, President Kais Saied said “hordes of illegal migrants” posed a demographic threat to the Arab-majority country.
His speech triggered a series of racially motivated attacks as thousands of sub-Saharan African migrants were pushed out of their homes and jobs.
Thousands were repatriated or attempted to cross the Mediterranean, while others were expelled to desert borders with Algeria and Libya.
At least a hundred died that summer.
This came as the European Union boosted efforts to curb arrivals, including a EUR 255 million deal with Tunis.
