Tunisian Premier, Vestige of the Old Government, Resigns

MANAMA, Bahrain — Tunisia’s prime minister, a holdover from the government that was toppled last month, resigned Sunday after a weekend of violent protests that left five people dead in the capital, Tunis.

The prime minister, Mohamed Ghannouchi, had been the target of weeks of demonstrations by protesters who felt that he was tainted by his links to the old government.

“My resignation will provide a better atmosphere for the new era,” Mr. Ghannouchi said on Tunisian national television. “My resignation is in the service of the country.”

Hours later, Tunisia’s interim president, Fouad Mebazaa, named a former government minister, Beji Caid-Essebsi, as the country’s new prime minister, the official Tunisian news agency, TAP, reported.

Tunisia has been unsettled since the upheaval that ousted President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, an event that became a catalyst for upheavals in neighboring Arab countries. Tunisia is also struggling to manage an influx of thousands of refugees from neighboring Libya, where rebels inspired by the Tunisians are seeking to overthrow the Libyan leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi.

It was unclear whether Mr. Ghannouchi’s resignation would mollify the various groups in Tunisia that have taken to the streets in recent weeks.

A protest on Saturday turned violent when men wielding knives and stones attacked the Interior Ministry building, according to TAP.

The Interior Ministry described the violence as “organized criminal acts.” Protesters set fire to several police vehicles, smashed windows and ransacked several stores nearby, according to the news agency.

Five protesters were killed and 16 security officers were injured, it said.

One witness described a peaceful protest that degenerated into a riot when a separate protest group arrived.

After the violence, the army banned pedestrians and traffic from the avenue in central Tunis where the Interior Ministry is based, an order that expired Sunday evening.

The military’s order did not appear to have achieved the desired effect.

Eric Goldstein, the deputy director of Human Rights Watch in the Middle East and North Africa, described “battles between security forces and rock-throwing youths” on Sunday, the third straight day of clashes.

Mr. Goldstein, who is in Tunis, described a chaotic scene of police officers beating protesters, assisted by “scores of young men in street clothes, some of them masked, clutching clubs, wooden planks and table legs.”

Some residents of Tunis have reported a deterioration of the overall security situation in recent days, although many areas of the capital remained safe, according to Roger J. Bismuth, a member of the Tunisian Senate and a businessman.

“Among the crowd of protesters there are many sincere people, but there are also hoodlums,” Mr. Bismuth said by telephone. “A revolution is a revolution. It has its moments of excitement and moments of disorder.”

Tunisia’s interim government has said it will chart the country’s path toward multiparty democracy but set no timetable for elections or a new Constitution.