An Algerian lawyer has announced filing a complaint to the United Nations on the “arbitrary detention” of Algerian political activist Karim Tabbou.
The lawyer, who resides in Canada, said he filed the complaint to the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention to protest against the continued imprisonment of Head of the Democratic and Socialist Union party.
On March 24, a court of appeals sentenced Tabbou for a year in prison on charges of “weakening army morale” in 2019 after criticizing the then army chief, Ahmed Gaed Salah, who died suddenly of a heart attack in late December
His lawyer said he had been unable to defend himself after suffering a medical problem, which he later revealed to be a stroke.
He had become the most prominent figure in the Hirak protest movement, which emerged in February 2019, shaking Algeria’s deeply entrenched political establishment with weekly mass protests that forced longtime leader Abdelaziz Bouteflika to resign.
The UN Human Rights Council in Geneva has previously slammed Algeria for detaining political activists, in some cases that date back to the 1990s.
In this context, the Appeal Court in the capital, Algiers, adjourned Tuesday the verdict in the case of journalist and political activist Fodil Boumala, who was accused of “weakening army morale.”
An Algiers court has acquitted him in early March, but the public prosecution has appealed the verdict.
The National Committee for the Liberation of Prisoners announced Tuesday the postponement of the trial of eight protesters to an unspecified date.
This step comes in light of the Ministry of Justice’s decision to adjourn all trials in line with the measures taken by the state to face the coronavirus outbreak.
