Latest News

A leading Tunisian opposition politician who had been critical of the Islamist-led government was fatally shot outside his home in Tunis Wednesday, the government news agency said.

Chokri Belaid in Tunis in 2010.

Chokri Belaid was shot just as he was leaving his house in the capital city, the state news agency TAP said.

Mr. Belaid, the general secretary of the Democratic Patriotic Party, was one of the leaders of the opposition Popular Front, which had been formed in October to counter the government.

Mr. Belaid has emerged as a chief critic of Ennahda, the moderate Islamist party that leads the government in a coalition with two secular parties. While Ennahda has tried to reassure Tunisians that it would respect liberal democratic values and not impose a strict Muslim moral code, it has faced criticism with an indulgent attitude toward the ultraconservative Islamists known as Salafis.

In recent days, Mr. Belaid accused the Islamists of carrying out an attack on a meeting of its members on Saturday. "At the end of our meeting, a group of Ennahda mercenaries and Salafists attacked our activists," Mr. Belaid said.

Samir Dilou, a government spokesman, was quoted as calling the killing an "odious crime."

No group immediately took responsibility for the shooting and its cause remained unclear.

It came as Tunisia faces profound social and religious uncertainties following the ouster of a dictatorial regime two years ago that set off what came to be known as the Arab Spring.