Tunisian police scatters anti-government protesters

PanARMENIAN.Net - Tunisian police with teargas and batons scattered protesters demanding the government's resignation on Friday, May 6 in the most violent confrontation for weeks with pro-democracy demonstrators.

Tension has risen in the North African country, whose 'Jasmine Revolution' inspired uprisings across the Arab world, after a former minister warned of a possible coup by loyalists of the ousted regime if Islamists win elections.

Demonstrators said that even though Tunisia's interim administration had denounced the comments, they raised doubts over whether it was serious about democracy. Elections are promised in July for an assembly to draw up a new constitution.

"The people want a new revolution," chanted protesters on Avenue Bourguiba, at the heart of the capital Tunis, before police moved in.

Security forces beat photographers and confiscated cameras from some as they covered the protest. They pursued protesters through side streets, swiping at them with batons.

A common thread running through uprisings across the Arab world sparked by the one in Tunisia has been unease among secularists and in the West about whether democracy will open the door to Islamic rule, according to Reuters.