ALGIERS: An Algerian court on Thursday released opposition figure Fethi Ghares and his wife under judicial supervision pending an investigation into the alleged insulting of President Abdelmadjid Tebboune and other charges, his lawyer said.
Ghares, a secular leftist opposition figure, was charged with “insulting the president of the republic” and “spreading false news and hate speech through posts on social media,” Abdelghani Badi, his lawyer, told AFP.
Messaouda Cheballah, Ghares’s wife who is also a political activist, was charged with “partaking” in the main defendant’s alleged wrongdoing, Badi added.
Badi said the couple are required to “report to the court every 15 days” pending a trial date.
The couple were also banned from posting information on social media or speaking to the media, said the lawyer, ahead of elections on September 7.
Fethi Ghares, 49, a former coordinator of the now-banned leftist Democratic and Social Movement party, was arrested on Tuesday by plain-clothes police at his home in the capital Algiers.
In a video posted on Facebook and titled “Where’s Fethi Ghares?,” his wife had said police asked her husband to follow them for what they said was “an interrogation” and that he had had no summons order.
Ghares, 49, was previously arrested in 2021 and later sentenced to prison — also on charges including insulting President Tebboune.
In January 2022, he was sentenced to two years behind bars for “harming the person of the president of the republic” and “spreading information that could harm national unity” and public order.
He was released in March 2022 after his sentence was reduced on appeal.
A figure from Algeria’s secular leftist opposition, Ghares in 2019 joined the pro-democracy Hirak movement — mass protests that swept veteran president Abdelaziz Bouteflika from power.
His Democratic and Social Movement party — a successor of the Algerian Communist Party — had all its activities indefinitely frozen by the authorities in February 2023.
Algeria opposition figure released under judicial supervision
https://arab.news/8pexs
Algeria opposition figure released under judicial supervision
- Ghares, a secular leftist opposition figure, was charged with “insulting the president of the republic”
US makes plans to reopen embassy in Syria after 14 years
- The administration has been considering re-opening the embassy since last year
- Trump told reporters on Friday that Al-Sharaa was “doing a phenomenal job” as president
WASHINGTON: The Trump administration has informed Congress that it intends to proceed with planning for a potential re-opening of the US Embassy in Damascus, Syria, which was shuttered in 2012 during the country’s civil war.
A notice to congressional committees earlier this month, which was obtained by The Associated Press, informed lawmakers of the State Department’s “intent to implement a phased approach to potentially resume embassy operations in Syria.”
The Feb. 10 notification said that spending on the plans would begin in 15 days, or next week, although there was no timeline offered for when they would be complete or when US personnel might return to Damascus on a full-time basis.
The administration has been considering re-opening the embassy since last year, shortly after longtime strongman Bashar Assad was ousted in December 2024, and it has been a priority for President Donald Trump’s ambassador to Turkiye and special envoy for Syria, Tom Barrack.
Barrack has pushed for a deep rapprochement with Syria and its new leadership under former rebel Ahmad Al-Sharaa and has successfully advocated for the lifting of US sanctions and a reintegration of Syria into the regional and international communities.
Trump told reporters on Friday that Al-Sharaa was “doing a phenomenal job” as president. “He’s a rough guy. He’s not a choir boy. A choir boy couldn’t do it,” Trump said. “But Syria’s coming together.”
Last May, Barrack visited Damascus and raised the US flag at the embassy compound, although the embassy was not yet re-opened.
The same day the congressional notification was sent, Barrack lauded Syria’s decision to participate in the coalition that is combating the Daesh militant group, even as the US military has withdrawn from a small, but important, base in the southeast and there remain significant issues between the government and the Kurdish minority.
“Regional solutions, shared responsibility. Syria’s participation in the D-Daesh Coalition meeting in Riyadh marks a new chapter in collective security,” Barrack said.
The embassy re-opening plans are classified and the State Department declined to comment on details beyond confirming that the congressional notification was sent.
However, the department has taken a similar “phased” approach in its plans to re-open the US Embassy in Caracas, Venezuela, following the US military operation that ousted former President Nicolás Maduro in January, with the deployment of temporary staffers who would live in and work out of interim facilities.
