Tunisian President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali in Saudi Arabia
A plane carrying Tunisian President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali landed in the Saudi Arabian city.
“We have welcomed His Excellency Ben Ali and his family to the kingdom,” the Saudi Press Agency quoted a government statement as saying.
Tunisian President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali left Tunisia on Friday after a month-long popular revolt that claimed dozens of lives. Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali had earlier fired his government and announced early elections.The Saudi government added it “wished for security and stability in this dear country” and stood “by the Tunisian people.”
The central train station in Tunis was on fire early Saturday just hours after Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali left the country. Tunisian Prime Minister Mohamed Ghannouchi, who had taken over as president, described the situation as complete security chaos. He called on residents to join forces to protect their belongings.
Supermarkets had also been set ablaze and witnesses described plundering and helicopters flying over the city with spotlights. Late Friday, shots were heard in the city centre, but had fallen silent in the early hours of Saturday.
A state of emergency was declared in Tunisia on Friday evening. The army took control of the main airport in Tunis and Tunisian airspace was closed.It was not clear whether Ben Ali had been forced to leave or had agreed to leave of his own accord.His departure was met internationally with calls for Tunisians to form a new government in as peaceful a manner as possible.
Tunisian President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, a 74-year-old former interior minister, had been president of the north African country since 1987, replacing self- styled “president for life” Habib Bourguiba when he was deposed in a coup.
Ben Ali’ s departure comes after a month of anti-government demonstrations that were brutally repressed by the police. More than 60 protesters have been killed since mid-December, most shot dead by police firing on crowds with live bullets.Friday’s protest in Tunis began peacefully but descended into chaos after the police fired tear gas into the crowd, causing a stampede that reportedly killed four people.
Ben Ali, who has been in power for 23 years, had been on the ropes since the authorities began firing on demonstrators protesting unemployment and high food prices since mid-December.The police brutality shocked citizens of the habitually stable country, which lives mainly off tourism and agriculture, and fanned the flames of protest.
The protests began in the central town of Sidi Bouzid on December 17, with the self-immolation of a desperate, hard-up vegetable vendor outside a government building.His action ignited a wave of protests that tapped into widespread discontent over high youth unemployment, rising food prices and rampant corruption.
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