Ghannouchi Sentenced to Life in Prison — And the Man Who Ran Tunisia's Intelligence Services Says the Charge Was Never Proven

A Tunis court on Tuesday sentenced Rached Ghannouchi, the 84-year-old leader of the Ennahdha movement and former speaker of parliament, to life in prison plus 30 years in the so-called "secret apparatus" case. Eleven co-defendants — including former Prime Minister Ali Laarayedh — also received life sentences, with additional terms reaching up to 96 years. Thirteen others were sentenced to between 10 and 48 years. All 35 defendants were placed under five years of administrative monitoring.

The court found the group guilty of forming a terrorist alliance and conducting espionage — charges rooted in the allegation that Ennahdha's clandestine security apparatus was linked to Ansar al-Charia, the jihadist organization accused of the 2013 assassinations of opposition politicians Chokri Belaïd and Mohamed Brahmi. Ennahdha has denied the existence of any such apparatus throughout the proceedings, calling the trial politically motivated.

Ghannouchi, who has been imprisoned since April 2023, was already carrying a 20-year sentence from a separate case. His accumulated sentences now exceed 106 years plus a life term. In April, Ennahdha reported he had been urgently transferred to hospital following a sharp deterioration in his health.

The verdict arrived 48 hours after something equally significant. On June 1, Kamel Guizani — the former Director General of Tunisia's intelligence services, who ran those services until 2023 — gave a six-and-a-half-hour interview on Al Jazeera from exile. He is himself convicted in absentia to 68 years in a separate political case. He said the following:

Guizani also claimed that surveillance of politicians, journalists, and civil society figures was conducted without judicial warrants and for political rather than security purposes, and that President Saied had "an obsession with wanting to spy on everyone" that he opposed on legal grounds.

The man who directed Tunisia's intelligence services through the period the prosecution covers has stated publicly — on the record, two days before the verdict — that the foundational claim of the terrorism charges was never proven by his own services. The court proceeded to hand down life sentences regardless. The verdict and the testimony now both stand in the historical record.

The European Union and the United States have not yet issued public statements on the verdicts.