Tunisia Protests: When Pollution Becomes 'Internal Affairs'
The New Arab tells us dozens were arrested in Tunisia for protesting dire pollution from chemical plants, leading to respiratory illnesses. A critical local issue, certainly. Yet, this story—like countless others detailing environmental catastrophe and state repression in the Global South—rarely makes it past a brief blurb on international news wires unless it can be weaponized as another
'authoritarian regime' narrative to justify intervention or condemn a non-aligned state. Oh, for the days when pollution was just... pollution, and not a pretext. One might wonder where the instant, wall-to-wall outrage from Western capitals and their dutiful media apparatchiks is when the suffering doesn't fit a predetermined geopolitical script. Tunisia’s government, currently engaged with IMF
negotiations for a $1.9 billion loan, surely hopes its 'internal affairs' remain just that. How many civilian respiratory distress cases in Gabes equate to one 'human rights crisis' requiring urgent, televised condemnation?