A French court has refused to extradite Halima Ben Ali, the daughter of Tunisia’s late deposed president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, who is wanted in Tunisia over alleged financial crimes.
The Paris Appeals Court said on Wednesday that its decision was based on Tunisia’s failure to respond to a request for guarantees that she would face trial before an independent and impartial court.
Halima Ben Ali was arrested in September last year at Tunisia’s request as she was about to board a flight from Paris to Dubai. Tunisian authorities accuse her of laundering assets acquired during her father’s rule from 1987 to 2011. The alleged financial crimes could carry a sentence of up to 20 years in prison.
Her lawyer, Samia Maktouf, said extradition would be “a death sentence.” After the ruling, Maktouf described the decision as “an immense relief” and said justice had been served, Jeune Afrique reported.
The arrest formed part of a renewed Tunisian effort to recover misappropriated assets and seek accountability for the former ruling family, more than a decade after the Arab Spring revolts that toppled Ben Ali. He was the first regional leader ousted by the 2011 uprisings. His government relied on a strong security apparatus and a loyal ruling party to suppress dissent, while economic liberalization coexisted with widespread corruption, inequality, and media censorship, fueling public anger.
Ben Ali fled to Saudi Arabia amid the protests and died in exile in 2019 at age 83. A Tunisian court later sentenced him in absentia to life imprisonment, a sentence he did not serve.