A French doctoral student who carried out sociological research in Tunisia has been detained since October 19 in the country, by order of military justice, the director of his research laboratory at the University of Aix-Marseille reported on Thursday, October 31. .
“It is totally exceptional that a young French researcher can appear before military justice” Tunisia, which generally deals with attacks on state security, regretted to AFP Vincent Geisser, director of the Institute for Research and Studies on the Arab and Muslim World, attached to the University of Aix-en-Provence and the National Center of Scientific Sciences of Marseille. Research (CNRS).
Victor Dupont, in his twenties, investigates the socio-professional career of “people who may have been involved at the time of the 2011 revolution”the first popular uprising of the “Arab Spring,” which ended the regime of Tunisian dictator Zine El-Abidine Ben Ali, Geisser said. “It is not a political issue linked to dissidents or opponents, it is not a security issue, it is a classic sociological issue”Geisser insisted, calling for his release.
“Total mobilization of French diplomatic services”
Mr. Dupont is attached to the European Research Council, which funds scientific programs of excellence. He had arrived in Tunisia about ten days before his arrest to conduct interviews.
“He was arrested on Saturday, October 19, by the Tunisian police, transferred to an interrogation center, placed in police custody and, on the same day, Saturday, referred to military justice.”according to Geisser. One of her friends, a French-Tunisian, was also detained shortly after and placed under arrest by military justice. “There is a total mobilization of the French diplomatic services”Geisser stressed. Victor Dupont’s family has been in Tunisia since the beginning of the week.
The country has been led since 2019 by President Kaïs Saïed, accused by civil society of “authoritarian drift”but he was re-elected with 90.7% of the votes on October 7.
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