After international protest, Tunisian court releases LGBT rights activist

Following an international protest, a Tunisia court ordered the release Wednesday of Rania Amdouni, the women’s rights defender and LGBTI activist who had been jailed for shouting at police. On March 4, Amdouni was sentenced to six months in prison and a fine for “insulting police and abuse of morals”. An appeals court ordered her to be released yesterday. Amdouni, 26, a member of the human rights group Damj, the Tunisian Association for Justice and Equality. “We are happy that Rania was freed today by the appeal court, but our concerns about freedoms continue, because for months Rania has been subjected to harassment by some Facebook pages of police unions,” her lawyer, Yassin Azzaza, told Reuters. Her release was welcomed by the activist groups Solidarité Internationale LGBTQI (SIL) and the Committee for the Respect of Freedoms and Human Rights in Tunisia (CRLDHT).