On January 7, Reporters Without Borders had at least five confirmed cases of bloggers and online activists being arrested. Here’s one:
Four or five police plainclothes officers arrested the blogger and activist Hamadi Kaloutcha at his home at around 6 am, seizing a computer and a central processing unit. They told his wife they were taking him to the nearest police station and “just have a few questions for him,” and “that will only take a few hours.” There has been no news of him since.
Several of those arrested, including Kaloutcha, were members of the Pirate Party of Tunisia; the Pirate Party U.K. later issued several statements deploring the disappearances.
“Pirate Parties around the world condemn these acts against freedom of expression, human rights and democracy, and call upon governments take firm action against Tunisia for these recent events,” one said. A later note said that one detainee had been beaten, and it said that several of the bloggers were accused of “degradation of state property on account of anonymous DDoS attacks.”