Police attack Tunisian workers

This is a video of a demonstration against poverty in Tunisia.

From daily The Morning Star in Britain:

Cops beat up protesters at union-led rally

Tuesday 28 December 2010

by Our Foreign Desk

Riot police laid into a union-led rally against unemployment in Tunis on Monday, battering teachers, posties, health workers and jobless graduates.

Around 2,000 protesters gathered outside the headquarters of the General Union of Tunisian Workers (UGTT), chanting “We need work” and “Stop the corruption.”

When they attempted to march towards a main thoroughfare in the capital police beat them back with batons, injuring at least a dozen.

The Tunis protest followed the police killing of a jobless graduate in Bouziane last Friday.

Clashes broke out earlier this month in the town of Sidi Bouzid after a man committed suicide by setting himself on fire in protest against unemployment.

Police had seized fruit and vegetables he was selling at a stall, saying he did not have the necessary paperwork.

Protests soon spread to several neighbouring cities.

Tunisia’s unemployment rate is officially 14 per cent, but the percentage of graduates without work is about double that.

The Tunisian League for the Defence of Human Rights said: “The root of the problems is the high rate of unemployment for university graduates, the high price of raw materials and agriculture being the sole source of work.”