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Four Possible Scenarios for Tunisia’s Political Crisis
Also published in National Interest

As waves of protest rock the country following mass arrests of political opponents, what will happen next?
Tunisia is entering a difficult moment. Following the arrest in late January of a labor union official for organizing a strike by tollbooth operators, the government launched a relentless string of arrests against political opponents. The president accused the arrested individuals of “conspiring” against state security and/or labeled them as “terrorists” without in most cases presenting sufficient evidence for the charges. This has given momentum to a protest movement organized by the trade union UGTT, which on March 4 mobilized the largest number of demonstrators against President Kais Saied since he took office, with similarly large protests being organized by a coalition of political parties. There are four imaginable scenarios for how this crisis would be resolved...