Tunisia has dismantled a extremist cell planning attacks including against security officials and a senior government official, a prosecution spokesman said.
“The cell was targeting security officials and a figure holding an important position within the government,” Sofiene Sliti said.
Twenty-nine of the 62 alleged militants were referred to trial under the country’s anti-terrorism law, Sliti said, while 20 others are on the run.
He said that seven other suspects were already behind bars for other offences while the last six members of the cell are awaiting trial. Tunisian media said the cell had planned to target Interior Minister Hedi Majdoub, but his ministry and Sliti refused to comment.
Tunisia has faced a rise in extremist attacks since the 2011 uprising that led to the overthrow of longtime dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.
Militant attacks in Tunisia have cost dozens of lives among security forces as well as civilians, and 59 foreign tourists were also killed in 2015.
Separately, Tunisia’s powerful UGTT labour union on Monday called on workers to mobilise against the government’s draft budget for 2017 which stipulates a public sector salary freeze.
The government on Friday approved a draft budget for next year that forecasts 2.5 per cent growth and a civil service pay freeze lasting at least a year.
The draft has yet to be approved by parliament. But the UGTT cried foul on Monday, saying in a statement that it “categorically rejects all the measures it had warned against… including postponing pay rises.”
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