Imprisoned cyber-dissident Zouhair Yahyaoui

Zouhair Yahyaoui, the detained founder of the web site TUNeZINE, who has been tortured and imprisoned since 4 June, will be 35 on 8 December. He was sentenced to two years in prison for daring to criticise President Ben Ali. All those wishing to support this cyber-dissident on his birthday should send the Tunisian justice minister ([email protected]) the following letter requesting his release: 1) To download the picture: - "right-click" (Windows) or "Ctrl + click" (Macintosh) on the picture to call up the context menu "Download image to disk" and select a location to store the picture (on your desktop, for example). 2) To send the e-mail message with the picture: - copy the following e-mail address (if your e-mail client is configured appropriately, just clicking on the address should open a new message window with the right address already in the To: field), open your e-mail client (Outlook, Entourage, Eudora...), paste the address into the To: field, and then attach the image you have just downloaded. This can me done in several ways, depending on your system. But the principle is the same: insertion of a file attachment. Background: The Tunis appeal court sentenced Yahyaoui on 10 July to one year in prison for "spreading false news with the intent of inducing belief in an attack on a person or property" and one year in prison for "theft and fraudulent use of means of communications." He had been arrested in an Internet café on 4 June by plain-clothes police, who took him to his home and searched his room, taking his computer equipment. During interrogation, he underwent three sessions of "suspension," a form of torture in which the victim is suspended by the arms with his feet barely touching the ground. In one of these sessions, Yahyaoui revealed the password to his web site, which enabled the authorities to block it. TUNeZINE today cannot be accessed in Tunisia. Yahyaoui is being held in Borj el Amri prison, 30 kms from Tunis. There he is suffering from kidney problems and scabies. He receives no mail. His family visits him once a week. As a writer, Yahyaoui used the pseudonym "Ettounsi," which means Tunisian in Arabic. He created the TUNeZINE web site in July 2001 to distribute opposition documents online and thereby provide information about the fight for democracy and freedoms in Tunisia. He was one of the first to distribute a letter to the president by Judge Mokhtar Yahyaoui criticising the judicial system.