Saturday, February 05, 2011

Tunisia will next week lift a state of emergency that was imposed last month by ousted President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali at the height of a popular revolt, Tourism Minister Mehdi Houass said Friday.
“Next week will see the lifting of the state of emergency,” the minister told reporters.

Meanwhile, the European Union slapped asset freezes Friday on 46 associates of ousted Tunisian leader Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali, an EU official told AFP.
The state of emergency, alongside a curfew and a ban on public gatherings, were imposed by Ben Ali on Jan. 14, a few hours before he fled the country.

Authorities have since then reduced the curfew period as protests abated.
“We wanted to do this step by step out of caution and to ensure total security for people,” Houass added.
Major street demonstrations have dried up in Tunisia in recent days, after a reshuffle purged the interim government of most Ben Ali loyalists. However, many Tunisians have called for more members of the old guard to be removed from their posts.

Houass said the country’s tourism industry recorded a sharp drop in activity during January, but authorities expect a public revolt that toppled the country’s president during the same month to appeal to more visitors.
Tourism receipts in 2010 inched up 1 percent from their level the previous year to 3.5 billion dinars ($2.48 billion) with around 7 million tourist arrivals, he said.

“The sector was down 40 percent in January but we are very optimistic for the first six months of 2011,” he said.
“The revolution has made our country known to the whole world … I think it is a good promotion … We want to tell all our friends that they can come to Tunisia in a atmosphere of peace [and] freedom,” he added.

Tourism is the country’s top foreign currency earner and employs 400,000 people, making it the second biggest employer after agriculture.

Thousands of tourists were evacuated as protests reached a head in January though hotels say January was the middle of the low season for the Mediterranean country.
Tunisia plans to boost security and introduce “innovative products” in order to boost the industry this year, Houass said.

In other developments, Tunisian Prime Minister Mohammad Ghannouchi met Friday with EU lawmakers at the Carthage Palace in Tunis. The lawmakers included Spanish Jose Ignacio Salafranca, a member of the European People’s Party Bureau and of the European Parliament’s Committee on Foreign Affairs, Italian Antonio Panzeri, chairman of the Delegation in charge of relations with Maghreb countries and European MP.
The European lawmakers met with Tunisia’s interim government in post-crisis talks following the regional bloc’s pledge to help the country’s democratic transition.

In Brussels, an EU official said European governments “adopted a decision to add 46 names to the list,” which previously featured only Ben Ali and his wife Leila Trabelsi, the official said. The additions are “essentially members of the two families,” the official said.

Tunisia’s former leading couple and their inner circle are suspected of having pocketed much of the country’s wealth over the years and of taking personal stakes in much of the economy. – Agencies