TUNISIAN PRESIDENT Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali moved to staunch continuing unrest across the country last night when he ordered the police to stop firing at protesters and pledged not to run again when his current term ends in 2014.
Mr Ben Ali, an authoritarian leader who has been in office for 23 years and had been expected to amend the constitution to allow himself a sixth term, also said prices for sugar, milk and bread would be reduced, and a free press allowed. The concessions, made in a television address, follow the worst disturbances Tunisia has seen in decades. Pressure on Mr Ben Ali had grown yesterday when two more civilians were reported killed and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, accused the authorities of “the indiscriminate killing of peaceful protesters”.
The latest official death toll from the worst unrest in decades in the north African state is 23, but the UN said rights groups claimed almost 40 civilians had lost their lives during the clashes.
“I understand the Tunisians, I understand their demands,” Mr Ben Ali said in his address. “I am sad about what is happening now after 50 years of service to the country, military service, all the different posts, 23 years of the presidency.”
He said he would not be president for life and would not change the constitution, which states that no one over 75 can run for the presidency. Mr Ben Ali is 74.
In a further sign of increasing international exasperation with the Tunisian government earlier yesterday, French prime minister François Fillon condemned the “disproportionate” use of force against the protesters.
That intervention followed a night of violence in Tunis, despite the imposition of a curfew and a strong military presence on the streets of the capital. Gunshots were reportedly heard in the city yesterday, while one man was killed during disturbances on Wednesday night.
In the provincial town of Sidi Bouzid, Reuters quoted several witnesses saying that between 7,000 and 10,000 people were marching through the streets yesterday. Their slogans demanded more jobs – the original grievance behind the protest movement – but also “freedom of expression, freedom of assembly, all the freedoms”. The government had sought to play down that wider dimension. “It’s a social problem,” Tunisia’s ambassador to France, Mohamed Raouf Najjar, said in a radio interview,“These demands for jobs are legitimate.”