Tunisian Journalist Ben Brik Released from Prison

Ben Brik posing with his wife, Azza, in their Tunis home after
serving his six-month prison sentence (EPA photo)

After completing a six-month prison sentence based on fabricated charges of assault, dissident journalist Taoufik Ben Brik today was released from Tunisia's toughest prison.

He was imprisoned in October on what the Tunisia Monitoring Group and other international press freedom organizations called "trumped-up charges," including damaging other people's property, violation of public morality standards, defamation and extreme aggression.

The charges stemmed from an alleged traffic incident between Ben Brik and an unidentified woman.

After his released, Ben Brik called the charges "a farce and everybody knows it."

He is one of the most vocal critics of the regime of President Ben Ali, and his imprisonment took place during the government's crackdown on independent journalists who denounced the Oct. 25 presidential elections, traditionally won by Ben Ali, as fraudulent.

Shortly after leaving the Siliana Prison in North Western Tunisia, he announced that he will travel to France to meet with friends and supporters to observe World Press Freedom Day on May 3. There he will also talk to editors about writing a book dealing his six months in prison, where his frail health deteriorated.

The free voices of Tunisia pay a heavy price for their right to speak out and trying to keep public officials accountable.