Tunisian leader declares Ansar al-Shari a terrorist organisation

Ali Larayedh says membership of Islamist group is a crime after proof of its involvement in killing of two politicians

  • The Guardian,
Tunisian Prime Minister Ali Larayedh
Tunisian prime minister Ali Larayedh has outlawed membership of Islamist group Ansar al-Sharia, declaring it a terrorist organisation. Photograph: Mohamed Messara/EPA

Tunisia's prime minister has declared an ultraconservative Islamist group a terrorist organisation after obtaining proof that it was involved in the murder of two opposition politicians.

Ali Larayedh said that Ansar al-Sharia was responsible for the assassinations of Chokri Belaid and Mohammed Brahmi, and announced that membership of the group was now a crime. Officials had previously announced that the same gun was used in both attacks.

"There will be no respite in the struggle against terrorists and against those who take up arms against the citizens and institutions of the state," said Larayedh. "We will ensure Tunisians have a future characterised by freedom and wellbeing."

Larayedh urged members of the group to quit or face prosecution. "Anyone belonging to it must face judicial consequences," he said.

Ansar al-Sharia is the most radical Islamist group to emerge in Tunisia since secular autocrat Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali was toppled in 2011, and it was also implicated in an attack last September on the US embassy in Tunis by protesters angered by a film mocking Islam.

The group's leader, Seifallah Ben Hassine, fought the Russians in Afghanistan and was later imprisoned by the former regime. He was released after the overthrow of Ben Ali and is now once more in hiding.

Religious groups have flourished in Tunisia since the revolution, with the election victory of the moderate Islamist Ennahda party and the rise of conservative Salafi groups calling for greater piety in society.

Many Salafi groups have resorted to violence and intimidation to push their views and include former militants in their ranks. Ansar al-Sharia has been accused of co-operating with militants fighting the army in the mountainous Jebel Chaambi region along the Algerian border.

After being accused by the opposition of turning a blind eye to Salafi excesses, the Islamist-led government eventually moved to confront them.

Ansar al-Sharia's annual conference was banned last May, provoking clashes between police and the group's supporters.

As the birthplace of the Arab spring and home to a relatively educated population, Tunisia's transition to democracy is being closely watched.

The process has stalled following Brahmi's assassination in July and nearly a third of the members of the elected assembly have withdrawn, calling for a new technocratic government. There have been fears that the transition could be derailed as happened in Egypt.

Larayedh restated Ennahda's position that the current government would first finish the constitution and the electoral law by October before handing over the actual running of the elections by the end of the year to a new government agreed through a national dialogue.

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