Tunisian lawyers have filed a lawsuit to prevent a scheduled visit by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to Tunisia, according to a spokesman on Monday.
"We filed a request to open an investigation into crimes committed by bin Salman,” Nizar Boujalal, a spokesman for a group of 50 lawyers, told reporters.
He said the investigation will include the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi and bloodshed in Yemen, Syria and Iraq.
“We hold the Saudi regime responsible for this bloodshed,” Boujalal said.
The spokesman, however, said the lawyers’ move was “symbolic” since “laws prevent the filing of complaints against any visits, including the Saudi crown prince’s visit”.
Bin Salman is scheduled to visit Tunisia on Tuesday as part of his current Arab tour, which started with visiting the United Arab Emirates (UAE) on Thursday.
Tunisian NGOs will stage protests on Monday against a planned visit by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to the country.
"Civil society organizations will organize protests against bin Salman’s visit,” Sakina Abdel-Samad, a member of the National Union of Tunisian Journalists, told a press conference in capital Tunis.
“We will also file a lawsuit over war crimes being committed in war-torn Yemen,” she said.
Groups that plan the protests include the Association of Tunisian Newspaper Directors (Turess), the National Syndicate of Journalists, the Tunisian Association of Democratic Women of Tunisia, the Tunisian Forum on Economic and Social Rights, the Tunisian Young Lawyers Association and the Tunisian Women's Association.
Abdel-Samad said the Tunisian Journalists Syndicate had received a “thank-you message” from the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) for its position against bin Salman's visit.
A poster of the Saudi crown prince holding a saw with slogans reading “Not Welcome in Tunisia, Land of Revolution” has been hung on the headquarters of the Journalists Syndicate in Tunis.
Bin Salman’s tour is his first since Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi journalist and a columnist for The Washington Post, was killed inside the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul last month.
After initially saying Khashoggi had left the consulate alive, weeks later the Saudi administration admitted he was killed there, blaming a rogue group of Saudi operatives.
Anadolu Agency
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