{"id":14569,"date":"2012-12-05T16:29:29","date_gmt":"2012-12-05T23:29:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/?p=14569"},"modified":"2012-12-05T16:29:29","modified_gmt":"2012-12-05T23:29:29","slug":"tunisias-islamists-attack-union-activists","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/?p=14569","title":{"rendered":"Tunisia&#8217;s Islamists attack union activists"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Tunisia&#8217;s Islamists attack union activists<\/strong><br \/>\n5 December, 2012 &#8211; Al Akhbar<\/p>\n<p>Supporters of Tunisia&#8217;s ruling Islamist party on Tuesday attacked a demonstration by the country&#8217;s main labor union, in the latest unrest two years after the revolution.<\/p>\n<p>Several dozen assailants attacked members of the General Union of Tunisian Workers (UGTT) who were gathered outside the union&#8217;s headquarters in Tunis to mark the 60th anniversary of the assassination of its founder, Farhat Hached.<\/p>\n<p>The police intervened to separate the two sides, but 10 demonstrators were wounded in the attack, according to the trade union.<\/p>\n<p>The interior ministry confirmed clashes had taken place between trade unionists and members of the League for the Protection of the Revolution.<\/p>\n<p>In October, an opposition party accused the League, which claims as its mission to protect the aims of the revolution that toppled former dictator Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali in January 2011, of beating a party official to death.<\/p>\n<p>UGTT secretary general Houcine Abassi blamed the &#8220;enemies of democracy&#8221; for Tuesday&#8217;s violence and denounced what he said was an unprecedented attack against his organization.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;They want to assassinate the UGTT on the day that it commemorates the assassination of Hached, who sacrificed his life for his people and his country,&#8221; Abassi told private radio station Shems FM.<\/p>\n<p>He said such an attack had never been witnessed before, &#8220;neither during the time of (Tunisia&#8217;s first president Habib) Bourguiba, nor of Ben Ali.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The League hit back, accusing the UGTT of provoking the clashes by attacking its members with batons when they tried to participate peacefully in the demonstration.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Whenever there is a protest by the left, they insult us, they insult the government and al-Nahda, even though no one has touched them. The reality is that they (leftist groups) are professional criminals,&#8221; the group said on its Facebook page.<\/p>\n<p>Rights organizations such as The Tunisian Human Rights League (LTDH) and the National Union of Journalists are to hold urgent meetings to discuss the implications of the incident.  <a href=\"http:\/\/english.al-akhbar.com\/content\/tunisias-islamists-attack-union-activists\" target=\"_blank\">&#8230;more<\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"igit_tsb_button\" style=\"float: left; margin-right: 10px;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/share?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.crookedbough.com%2F%3Fp%3D14569&amp;text=Tunisia%27s+Islamists+attack+union+activists&amp;count=horizontal&amp;via=\" style=\"\" class=\"twitter-share-button\">Tweet<\/a><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Tunisia&#8217;s Islamists attack union activists 5 December, 2012 &#8211; Al Akhbar Supporters of Tunisia&#8217;s ruling Islamist party on Tuesday attacked a demonstration by the country&#8217;s main labor union, in the latest unrest two years after the revolution. Several dozen assailants attacked members of the General Union of Tunisian Workers (UGTT) who were gathered outside the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/?p=14569#more-'\" class=\"more-link\">more \u00bb<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[247],"tags":[2635],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14569"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/27"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14569"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14569\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14570,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14569\/revisions\/14570"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14569"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14569"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crookedbough.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14569"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}