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AFP
Thousands of Tunisians gathered Tuesday in defence of liberty as they marked Independence Day amid fears of a widening divide between secular and religious groups in the newly democratised nation.
Waving the Tunisian flag and singing the national anthem, the group chanted: "Liberty, dignity" as they gathered on Tunis' main Avenue Bourguiba.
Elsewhere in the capital, President Moncef Marzouki said the national day celebrations presented "an opportunity for us all to rethink our relationships, to live with our differences, and despite our differences".
"National unity cannot last if it is built on misunderstanding, hatred and division," he told a flag-raising ceremony at the presidential palace in Carthage.
Tunisia is grappling with its new identity after a revolution that led to the ouster in January last year of longtime authoritarian president Zine el Abidine Ben Ali and triggered the Arab Spring uprisings.
The country is now governed by moderate Islamist leaders, but they are under pressure from a radical Muslim fringe known as Salafists to increase the role of Islam in the country's politics.
A long-running dispute over a university's decision to ban women from wearing the full-face veil, or niqab, has proven especially significant.
Salafists have spent months demonstrating at Manouba University, about 25 kilometres (15 miles) from Tunis, and on March 7, a Salafist activist tried to replace the national flag flying over the roof of the arts and humanities faculty building, with the black flag of Islam.
Subsequent secular attacks saw eggs thrown at the walls of mosques at Ben Guerdane, near the border with Libya. Inside the mosques, copies of the Koran were found torn up.
In Tunis, vandals drew the Star of David, a Jewish symbol, on the walls of the El Fath mosque.
"We've seen this month criminal attempts to attack our union and sow sedition and hatred among our citizens," Marzouki said.
"On behalf of the Tunisian state, I apologise to any Tunisian who has been subjected to injustice for his beliefs since independence," the president added.
Last week, Islamist sympathisers marched on parliament to demand the inclusion of Sharia law in the new constitution being drafted by a special, elected assembly.
But Tuesday's protesters waved banners insisting: "Leave my Tunisia free", and "Separation of religion and state".
"I have fought against dictatorship and I came here to make it clear that we will never accept to be under another dictatorship," demonstrator Oum Zyed said.
"There are attacks against our liberty, and we are here today against the introduction of the Sharia, the Islamic law, in our future constitution and to insist on a democratic constitution that respects the liberties and rights of all Tunisians," added Mongi Ellouz, an official in the Progressive Democratic Party.
Tunisia on Tuesday celebrated 56 years since winning independence from France.
Marzouki pardoned about 2,400 prisoners to mark the occasion, reducing the sentences of prisoners older than 65, younger than 20 or those with serious illnesses or handicaps.
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