Halima Ben Ali, younger daughter of former president Zine El-Abidine Ben Ali, was arrested yesterday Tuesday September 30, in France at the request of the Tunisian authorities. It must be presented today Wednesday October 1 at the Parquet General for the “notification of the provisional arrest request” issued by Tunisia, before appearing before the delegated advisor to rule on his possible placement under extradition or judicial nut, added the same source. The investigating chamber of the Court of Appeal, competent in terms of extradition, will subsequently hold a hearing on the file.
In a press release to AFP, her lawyer Samia Maktouf denounced a “woman hunt launched by Tunisia, an unprecedented relentlessness”. According to her, Halima Ben Ali is the subject of a red notice from Interpol issued by Tunisia for accusations of embezzlement. “My client never committed a crime or offense and left Tunisia when she was still a minor, at 17. We are trying to take revenge on the former head of state, his father, through her. We fully trust French justice to make law triumph, ”she added.
The lawyer also recalled that her client had already been arrested at the request of Tunisia in 2018 in Italy, but that she had been released. Halima Ben Ali, who lives and works in Dubai, was in Paris for a short stay when she was arrested at the airport towards her return to the United Arab Emirates. Me Maktouf expressed his fear of a “lynching” if his extradition to Tunisia was decided. She indicated that a report would be sent to the French Minister of the Interior concerning the conditions of the arrest, during which a Franco-Tunisian policewoman would have publicly qualified as “thief”.
The arrest occurs more than 14 years after the flight of Zine El-Abidine Ben Ali of Tunisia, on January 14, 2011, following a popular revolt launched by the immolation by the fire of a traveling seller in Sidi-Bouzid. The former president had left the country accompanied by his second wife Leila Trabelsi and their children, Halima and Mohamed Zine El-Abidine, for an exile in Saudi Arabia where he spent the last eight years of his life.
