A Tunisian court has sentenced a man to death for Facebook posts deemed offensive to President Kais Saied, his lawyer and a rights group said Friday.
The defendant, 51-year-old Saber Chouchane, was convicted on charges including “spreading false news” and “insulting the president, the justice minister, and the judiciary,” his lawyer Oussama Bouthelja told AFP. Some of the posts were also classified as incitement.
The verdict was delivered on Wednesday by a court in Nabeul, east of Tunis. Chouchane, who has been in detention since January 2024, will appeal the ruling. The court has not commented, and the exact content of his posts remains unclear.
Tunisia retains the death penalty in law for crimes such as inciting armed chaos, but has not carried out executions since 1991. Courts, however, continue to issue capital sentences.
Saied, elected in 2019, seized sweeping powers in 2021. Critics say his 2022 decree criminalising “false news” has become a tool to silence dissent, with dozens of opponents now jailed under the law.
