The opposition Ennahda movement in Tunisia confirmed on Tuesday that the security forces closed all party headquarters, including its central headquarters, and prevented its employees from entering it.

This decision comes after the arrest of party leader Rashid Ghannouchi by security forces during breakfast at his home.

"A security force entered the party's main headquarters and demanded those present there to leave and closed it... Other security forces also closed all the party's offices in the country and prevented meetings there," party leader Riyad al-Shuaibi told AFP.

The Ennahda movement announced that its leader, Rashid Ghannouchi, was arrested on Monday evening by a security unit that raided his house in the capital and took him to an "unknown destination," then announced that he was being interrogated in a security barracks in the capital.

The party condemned the arrest and demanded his immediate release.

The judicial authorities in Tunisia did not comment on the reasons for this arrest, which comes after statements in which Ghannouchi said that "there is an intellectual and ideological impediment in Tunisia that establishes civil war."

He added, "Do not imagine Tunisia without one party or the other, Tunisia without a renaissance, Tunisia without political Islam, Tunisia without the left, or any component. It is a project for civil war. This is a crime in reality."

For his part, Ahmed Naguib al-Shabi, head of the National Salvation Front, the coalition opposing President Kais Saied, in which Ennahdha participates, said that the police forces "prevented the organization of a press conference for the front today and set up barriers in front of the party's headquarters."

In addition, two leaders of the Ennahda movement, Belkacem Hassan and Muhammad al-Qumani, were arrested, according to Shuaibi.

Ghannouchi was repeatedly brought before the Public Prosecution Office as part of his investigation in cases related to corruption and terrorism.

Since the beginning of February, at least twenty personalities, most of them dissidents belonging to the Ennahda Party and its allies, have been arrested, in addition to the influential businessman Kamal al-Latif and the director of a large private radio station.

President Saeed described the detainees as "terrorists" and accused them of "conspiring against the internal and external security of the state."

Non-governmental human rights organizations considered this campaign of arrests a "deliberate attempt to stifle the opposition, especially criticism of the president," and urged Saeed to "stop this campaign, which has political considerations."

Saied seeks to complete his political project based on an enhanced presidential system and put an end to the parliamentary system that was approved following the 2011 revolution that overthrew the Ben Ali regime and put the country on a path to a unique democratic transition in the region.

Since July 25, 2021, Saied has seized power and amended the constitution to establish a presidential system at the expense of Parliament, which no longer has actual powers.