Still according to this same press release, a hearing has been set for Monday May 18. “While the French bars were organizing themselves to respond to this call for mobilization, the hearing was hastily brought forward to May 11,” said the magistrates.
Postponed to May 21
The Tunisian lawyer’s defense had already been organized. “On April 29, the office of the Conference of Presidents, an association which brings together the 163 French provincial bars, adopted a motion denouncing the attacks on the rights of the defense, affirming its solidarity with Mr. President of the President Chawki Tabib and the Tunisian bar, and calling on the presidents of France to go to Tunis for the trial hearing.”
The change in the hearing date “did not dissuade the Agen bar from expressing, through its presence at the hearing, its solidarity with its Tunisian colleague and its vigilance regarding the progress of the trial. Maître Eléa Cerdan, member of the Bar Council and representative of the Agen Bar for Human Rights, joined the delegation of French lawyers who traveled to Tunis.
The lawyers present, in the press release from the Agen bar, report an “electric atmosphere”, “the state of physical and moral dejection of the concrete worker Chawki Tabib, after a month of detention, […] such as the difficulties encountered by its lawyers in exercising their ministry.” The lawyers demanded the necessary time to prepare their colleague’s defense.
