The Freedom to Write Committee mourns the passing of Zouhair Yahyaoui. According to his family, he died of a heart attack on Sunday, March 13, 2005. He was arrested in June 2000 and sentenced to over two years in prison for “propagation of false news,” “theft from an employer,” and unauthorized use of the internet. He was released in November 2003 after qualifying for conditional release, having served more than half his sentence.
CASE HISTORY
Zouhair Yahyaoui (pen name “Ettounsi”, “the Tunisian”) was a graduate in economic sciences and an internet journalist. In July 2001 he founded the internet site TUNeZINE.com shortly after his graduation from college, to disseminate information concerning the struggle for democracy in Tunisia and to publish opposition material.
What began as a one-man operation expanded to a nucleus of five people. The e-magazine ran scathing reports of human rights violations in Tunisia, critiques of the fifteen-year-long regime of President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali, challenges to the tourism industry and discussion boards for visitors. TUNeZINE rapidly became one of the most popular virtual spaces in Tunisia, and Yahyaoui became famous in July of 2001 when he was the first to diffuse over his website an open letter that his uncle, Judge Mokhtar Yahyaoui, had addressed to President Ben Ali denouncing the total lack of independence accorded to the judiciary in Tunisia. One of his friends has been quoted as saying of him: “he has chosen his own way in life and does not hide himself away. He talks big, both at home and in public. He talks loudly sometimes, and allows himself to say what others only think… He is a national treasure, and a force for international understanding.”
Yahyaoui was the subject of government censorship after the founding of TUNeZINE. This constant threat forced him to be creative in maintaining public access to the website. For example, government attempts to block site access in Tunisia were circumvented by providing proxy websites each week.
Zouhair Yahyaoui was also an Honorary Member of the English PEN Center. He was one of the 2003 recipients of the PEN/Barbara Goldsmith Freedom to Write Award.