Abdallah Zouari

Tunisian blogger and former political prisoner Abdallah Zouari was arrested on 15 September 2009 by plainclothes agents in the southern city of Zarzis.

During the eight hours he was detained, Zouari was asked to disclose the passwords of his email accounts and interrogated about his most recent report published the day before on the banned Tunisnews website.

Mr Zouari was questioned about members of human rights groups who visited him in the last seven years and his media interviews Mr Zouari was warned to stop making statements that could tarnish the image of Tunisia, and threatened with a  smear campaign featuring fake pornographic video to damage his reputation.

Since his release in 2002, after 11 years in jail, Mr Zouari remains confined to internal exile in a rural district 500 kilometers from his family's home in Tunis. His confinement continues despite a court order issued on August 2nd, 2009, which purportedly ended seven years of house arrest.

Mr Zouari is under round-the-clock police surveillance, prevented from accessing the Internet and prohibited from using local Internet cafés. He has been arrested several times for protesting the banishment and mistreatment and for communicating with the outside world through the Internet.

Abdallah Zouari is blogging at Citizen Zouari‬. His blog is among tens of other critical blogs that are blocked in Tunisia.