Tunisian security forces used tear gas and truncheons yesterday to disperse a crowd of protesters in the capital demanding the government step down for failing to prosecute supporters of the ousted president.
Thousands of people also gathered for protests in towns and cities elsewhere, in the biggest show of popular anger in months in Tunisia, the country whose revolution inspired the “Arab Spring” uprisings.
Several hundred protesters tried to assemble in front of the interior ministry headquarters in central Tunis. “We need a new revolution . . . Nothing has changed,” one protester, Mounir Troudi, said. “This government should leave right now.”
Police, who were gathered in large numbers in front of the interior ministry, fired tear gas canisters and hit some of the protesters with truncheons, forcing them to scatter.
Some groups involved in toppling former president Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali say he and his supporters should have been prosecuted more vigorously. They suspect some in government of sympathising with the ousted administration.
There was an outpouring of anger after the justice minister under Mr Ben Ali was released from jail and a high-profile friend of the ex-president’s wife fled to Paris without facing trial.
Mr Ben Ali himself has been tried and found guilty in absentia on charges including theft, corruption and illegal possession of drugs and weapons, receiving sentences of up to 35 years.