Tunisia: Human Rights Watch Mourns the Death of Zouhair Yahiaoui

Human Rights Watch mourns the death of Zouhair Yahiaoui, a Tunisian who spent a year and-a-half in prison for editing an irreverent website critical of president Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali. Yahiaoui died in Tunis on March 13, at the age of thirty-six, of a heart attack.

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Yahiaoui was arrested in June 2002 after police identified him as "Ettounsi," the pseudonymous writer whose acerbic commentaries appeared in the online magazine he had founded, Tunezine. He was convicted on trumped-up charges and sentenced to two years in prison.  
 
In a country where little public criticism of the government is tolerated, Yahiaoui became the first writer to be jailed for his online writing. The case of Tunisia's cyberdissident attracted worldwide attention and he was freed from prison in November 2003, half a year early.  
 
Yahiaoui had received several awards in recognition of his courage, including, in 2004, the Hellman-Hammett award for persecuted writers.  
 
Human Rights Watch expresses its condolences to Yahiaoui’s family, his companion, Sophie Piekarec, and his friends..