20110116
reuters

TUNIS (Reuters) - Tunisian politicians tried to form a unity government on Sunday but the relative calm enforced by the army two days after the president was ousted was broken by a gunfight outside an opposition party headquarters.

The PDP party said police and military stopped a carload of armed men, whom it described as foreigners, and shots were fired. Security forces pursued the gunmen into nearby apartment buildings.

Tanks were stationed around Tunis and soldiers were guarding public buildings. Residents said they were starting to feel more secure after drive-by shootings and jailbreaks on Saturday in which dozens of inmates were killed.

"Last night we surrounded our neighbourhood with roadblocks and had teams checking cars. Now we are in the process of lifting the roadblocks and getting life back to normal," said a man, Imed, in the city's Intilaka suburb.

The official who was in charge of security for ousted President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali is to appear in court on charges of stoking violence and threatening national security.

The only occasional sounds of gunfire overnight were a marked change from the heavy shooting the previous night but analysts say there may be more protests if the opposition believes it is not sufficiently represented in a new government.

Sunday is not a working day and the streets were quiet, but some people were shopping for food. For the first time in days, a few vans and pick-up trucks were making deliveries.

Showing their contempt for Ben Ali's family, several hundred people filed through the empty, ransacked home of the former president's nephew, Kaif Ben Ali, taking photographs, picking up plants as souvenirs and stripping out plumbing fixtures.