A couple of weeks ago a man threw an egg at Tunisia's culture minister and the assault was filmed by a TV cameraman. Two days later, after his broadcaster, Astrolabe TV, released the footage, the camera operator, Mourad Mehrezi, was arrested.
A week later, on 23 August, he was charged with conspiring with the egg-thrower - film director Nasreddine Shili - to assault a public servant and harming public morals. He also faces a further seven charges in a trial due to start on Thursday (5 September). If convicted of all charges, he could spend seven years in prison.
But his TV bosses say they assigned him to film an event in Tunis to mark the 40th anniversary of the death of a Tunisian artist. Astrolabe TV's director, Ahmed Amine Ben Saad, showed Human Rights Watch (HRW) his written mission order.
HRW's acting Middle East and north Africa director, Joe Stork, said: "The lack of evidence of conspiracy means that Mehrezi is effectively detained for doing his job… His prosecution is a bad precedent for media freedom in Tunisia."
The public prosecutor's office said that Mehrezi and Shili have confessed that they prepared the assault together and that Mehrezi knew of it in advance.
But one of the lawyers on Mehrezi's and Shili's defence team told HRW that Mehrezi had refused to sign what he regards as a falsified police statement.
Source: HRW
