More than 471 former heads of state, scholars, and civil society leaders from over 30 countries have signed an international appeal demanding immediate and unconditional release of Rached Ghannouchi, the 85-year-old Tunisian scholar and former speaker of parliament sentenced in June 2026 to life in prison plus 30 additional years.
The appeal has drawn signatures from an unusually broad and ideologically diverse coalition, including Moncef Marzouki, former President of Tunisia; Abdullah Gül, former President of Türkiye; and Mustafa Cerić, former Grand Mufti of Bosnia and Herzegovina – alongside more than 400 professors, scholars, and experts from leading universities and human rights organisations across the United States, Europe, and the Muslim world.
“This is a global chorus of former presidents, scholars, and human rights defenders – people who do not agree on much else – saying with one voice that an 85-year-old man should not die in prison for his political beliefs,” said Radwan A. Masmoudi, President of CSID. “We are calling on the Tunisian government, and on every government that values due process, to act now, before it is too late.”
Ghannouchi is president of Tunisia’s Ennahdha movement and served as speaker of Tunisia’s parliament from 2019 to 2021, when President Kais Saied ordered the military to shut it down on July 25, 2021. He has been imprisoned since April 2023.