PARIS: Tunisia’s President Moncef Marzouki said yesterday he would free a young Tunisian man jailed last year for posting cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed (peace be upon him) online once tensions in the country had eased.
Jabbeur Mejri was sentenced at a closed hearing in March 2012 to seven and half years in jail for posting caricatures of the Prophet on his Facebook page.
He petitioned the president for a pardon earlier this year, saying he regretted his actions. “I will have him freed. I am just waiting for the political situation to calm down,” Marzouki said in an interview with French radio station France Info.
“I will free him, I am simply waiting for the right window of opportunity both for his security and for the security of the country.” Mejri and his co-defendant Ghazi Beji, both unemployed and militant atheists, were charged with “publishing works likely to disturb public order” and “offence to public decency”.
AFP
