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THE Tunisian army blocked off a square where rival protesters had confronted each other in Tunis yesterday, declaring it a “closed military zone” to try to stave off rising unrest.Tensions have been growing over opposition efforts to oust the Islamist-led government following last week’s assassination of a leftist politician, the second such killing in six months.

After protesters clashed early yesterday in the capital’s central Bardo square, where Tunisia’s Constituent Assembly is located, the army sealed it off with barbed wire and fencing.

In the southern city of Sidi Bouzid, angry protesters tried to storm municipal offices to stop employees from going to work, residents said, sparking clashes with supporters of the Islamist Ennahda party, which leads the transitional government.

The army intervened to protect the offices and police fired tear gas, but residents said thousands of demonstrators were still gathering in the southern city, the cradle of the revolt that overthrew President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali in 2011.

“Now many of the protesters are coming in   carrying   batons    and   it   looks   like the   situation   is    going   to   escalate   because   both   sides   are   standing   firm,” one resident, Mahdi al-Hurshani, told Reuters by telephone.

Tunisians fear they may be plunging into one of the worst crises in their political transition since Ben Ali was forced to flee by an uprising that inspired unrest across the Arab world.

Opposition leaders say they might set up a rival “salvation government”, an idea they were due to discuss yesterday.
The secular opposition, emboldened by the Egyptian army’s ousting of an Islamist president this month, is now rejecting all concessions and reconciliation efforts by the government.

The unrest has erupted just weeks before the transitional Constituent Assembly was set to complete a draft of a new constitution. The opposition now demands that the 217-member body be dissolved. Seventy lawmakers   have   left   it   and   set   up   a sit-in outside the Assembly offices in Bardo square.

Cabinet ministers were due to have an emergency meeting yesterday to discuss the political crisis, an official said, and a message from the prime minister to the nation is expected soon.

France called for restraint and said it was worried by events in Tunisia, where it was once the colonial power, urging the authorities to ensure an open transition to democracy.

“(France) supports the transition process under way in solidarity with all of the Tunisian people,” said a foreign ministry statement.
“It   urges   the   Tunisian   authorities   to   see this transition through to the end, in a spirit of dialogue and respect for the roadmap.”

The army fenced off Bardo square after rival protesters threw rocks at each other and police dispersed them. Opposition sources said security forces beat one of the lawmakers who had quit the Constituent Assembly. He was taken to hospital.

“The prime minister will be held accountable for any drop of blood spilled in the Bardo sit-in,” opposition figure Manji Rahawi said. —  Reuters.