Tunisia Probes Corruption Allegations against Ministers, MPs

Tunisian President Saied meets with Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry on Tuesday. (Tunisian Presidency)
Tunisian President Saied meets with Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry on Tuesday. (Tunisian Presidency)
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Tunisia Probes Corruption Allegations against Ministers, MPs

Tunisian President Saied meets with Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry on Tuesday. (Tunisian Presidency)
Tunisian President Saied meets with Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry on Tuesday. (Tunisian Presidency)

A former Tunisian prime minister, ministers, MPs and senior economic officials are facing charges of financial and administrative corruption after a non-governmental organization opened investigations against them.

Among them are former Finance Minister Nizar Yaish and current Central Bank Marouane El Abassi, who are both candidates to the position of prime minister. Reports have said that they have declined the appointment.

The Raqabah anti-corruption monitor, which monitors corruption cases in the country, accused sacked Prime Minister Hichem Mechichi, El Abassi and Yaish, of financial and administrative fraud and illicit profits in financial issues related to the Covid-19 pandemic.

The head of the monitor, Imed Daimi, former minister and advisor at the presidential palace in 2012 and 2013, said that the Competition Council (a government agency that follows up corruption cases) pledged to file an “urgent case against the governor of the Central Bank, the Minister of Finance and the former prime minister.”

Meanwhile, the presidency has intensified consultations with a number of countries and regional and international capitals, including Washington, Paris, Algeria, Cairo and Libya, to resolve the crisis in Tunisia.

President Kais Saied, who had met with the Algerian Foreign Minister twice and received phone calls from Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune, received an Egyptian delegation headed by Sameh Shoukry, the Egyptian Minister of Foreign Affairs to discuss the situation in the country. The Tunisian presidency also received phone calls from French and American officials.



Fears for Gaza Hospitals as Fuel and Aid Run Low

The Palestinian health ministry in Gaza said Friday that hospitals have only two days' fuel left before they must restrict services, after the UN warned aid delivery to the war-devastated territory is being crippled. - AFP
The Palestinian health ministry in Gaza said Friday that hospitals have only two days' fuel left before they must restrict services, after the UN warned aid delivery to the war-devastated territory is being crippled. - AFP
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Fears for Gaza Hospitals as Fuel and Aid Run Low

The Palestinian health ministry in Gaza said Friday that hospitals have only two days' fuel left before they must restrict services, after the UN warned aid delivery to the war-devastated territory is being crippled. - AFP
The Palestinian health ministry in Gaza said Friday that hospitals have only two days' fuel left before they must restrict services, after the UN warned aid delivery to the war-devastated territory is being crippled. - AFP

The Palestinian health ministry in Gaza said Friday that hospitals have only two days' fuel left before they must restrict services, after the UN warned aid delivery to the war-devastated territory is being crippled.

The warning came a day after the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former defence minister Yoav Gallant more than a year into the Gaza war.

The United Nations and others have repeatedly decried humanitarian conditions, particularly in northern Gaza, where Israel said Friday it had killed two commanders involved in Hamas's October 7, 2023 attack that triggered the war.

Gaza medics said an overnight Israeli raid on the cities of Beit Lahia and nearby Jabalia resulted in dozens killed or missing.

Marwan al-Hams, director of Gaza's field hospitals, told reporters all hospitals in the Palestinian territory "will stop working or reduce their services within 48 hours due to the occupation's (Israel's) obstruction of fuel entry".

World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said he was "deeply concerned about the safety and well-being of 80 patients, including 8 in the intensive care unit" at Kamal Adwan hospital, one of just two partly operating in northern Gaza.

Kamal Adwan director Hossam Abu Safia told AFP it was "deliberately hit by Israeli shelling for the second day" Friday and that "one doctor and some patients were injured".

Late Thursday, the UN's humanitarian coordinator for the Palestinian territories, Muhannad Hadi, said: "The delivery of critical aid across Gaza, including food, water, fuel and medical supplies, is grinding to a halt."

He said that for more than six weeks, Israeli authorities "have been banning commercial imports" while "a surge in armed looting" has hit aid convoys.

Issuing the warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant, the Hague-based ICC said there were "reasonable grounds" to believe they bore "criminal responsibility" for the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare, and crimes against humanity including over "the lack of food, water, electricity and fuel, and specific medical supplies".

At least 44,056 people have been killed in Gaza during more than 13 months of war, most of them civilians, according to figures from Gaza's health ministry which the United Nations considers reliable.