Tunisia’s Ghannouchi Starts 3-Day Hunger Strike in Prison

FILE PHOTO: Tunisia's Rached Ghannouchi is surrounded by presidential guard members upon his arrival for questioning after he was summoned by Tunisian anti-terrorism police in Tunis, Tunisia April 1, 2022. REUTERS/Zoubeir Souissi/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: Tunisia's Rached Ghannouchi is surrounded by presidential guard members upon his arrival for questioning after he was summoned by Tunisian anti-terrorism police in Tunis, Tunisia April 1, 2022. REUTERS/Zoubeir Souissi/File Photo
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Tunisia’s Ghannouchi Starts 3-Day Hunger Strike in Prison

FILE PHOTO: Tunisia's Rached Ghannouchi is surrounded by presidential guard members upon his arrival for questioning after he was summoned by Tunisian anti-terrorism police in Tunis, Tunisia April 1, 2022. REUTERS/Zoubeir Souissi/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: Tunisia's Rached Ghannouchi is surrounded by presidential guard members upon his arrival for questioning after he was summoned by Tunisian anti-terrorism police in Tunis, Tunisia April 1, 2022. REUTERS/Zoubeir Souissi/File Photo

Jailed Tunisian opposition leader Rached Ghannouchi has begun a three-day hunger strike in support of other imprisoned opposition figures, his Ennahda party said on Friday.

Ghannouchi, 82, was sentenced to a year in jail in May on charges of incitement and plotting against state security. More than 20 other opposition figures have been detained this year.

An Ennahda party statement said its leader had launched the three-day action to support fellow jailed opposition figures who are protesting at what they say is unjust imprisonment.

Jawher Ben Mbarak, a prominent opposition figure who has been detained for more than seven months, began an open-ended hunger strike this week, arguing that his jailing was politically motivated.

President Kais Saied has called his critics criminals, traitors and terrorists and warned that any judge who freed them would be considered to be abetting them.

Ghannouchi was parliament speaker from the 2019 election and his party was the biggest in the legislature until Saied sent tanks to shut it down in 2021.



Iraqi Oil Minister: Kurdistan Region's Oil Exports to Resume Next Week

A view shows the al-Shuaiba oil refinery in southwest Basra, Iraq April 20, 2017. Reuters
A view shows the al-Shuaiba oil refinery in southwest Basra, Iraq April 20, 2017. Reuters
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Iraqi Oil Minister: Kurdistan Region's Oil Exports to Resume Next Week

A view shows the al-Shuaiba oil refinery in southwest Basra, Iraq April 20, 2017. Reuters
A view shows the al-Shuaiba oil refinery in southwest Basra, Iraq April 20, 2017. Reuters

Oil exports from the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region will resume next week, Iraq's oil minister said on Monday, resolving a near two-year dispute as ties between Baghdad and Erbil improve.
The oil flows were halted by Türkiye in March 2023 after the International Chamber of Commerce ordered Ankara to pay Baghdad damages of $1.5 billion for unauthorized pipeline exports by the Kurdistan Regional Government between 2014 and 2018.

"Tomorrow, a delegation from the Ministry of Oil... will visit the Kurdish region to negotiate the mechanism for receiving oil from the region and exporting it. The export process will resume within a week," Oil Minister Hayan Abdel-Ghani told reporters.

According to Reuters, he added that Baghdad would receive 300,000 barrels per day from the region.

Erbil-based Rudaw TV earlier cited Kurdistan's natural resources minister, Kamal Mohammed, as saying oil exports could resume before March as all legal procedures have been completed.

The Iraqi parliament approved a budget amendment this month to subsidize production costs for international oil companies operating in Kurdistan, a move aimed at unblocking northern oil exports.

The resumption is expected to ease economic pressure in the Kurdistan region, where the halt has led to salary delays for public sector workers and cuts to essential services.