Tunisian activists are calling for protests over the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi when Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman visits next week.
The crown prince on Thursday began a tour of several Arab countries in the United Arab Emirates, his first trip abroad since the murder, which has strained Saudi Arabia's ties with the West and battered his image abroad.
While Tunisia's presidency said on Friday he was welcome, activists have called for protests in front of the presidential palace in Carthage during Prince Mohammed's trip on Tuesday and are trying to mount a legal challenge to stop the visit.
Since the 2011 uprising that ended the rule of former president Zine el-Abidine ben Ali and triggered the Arab Spring protests that convulsed the region, Tunisia has become one of the few Arab countries where protests are allowed.
"The blood of Khashoggi has not dried yet, the murderer bin Salman is not welcome in Tunisia, the country of democratic transition," Neji Bghouri, the president of the journalists' syndicate, said.
A group of 50 lawyers has been tasked by journalists, bloggers and human right activists to lodge a complaint in the Tunisian courts to oppose the visit, lawyer Nizar Boujlel said.
Saudi Arabia has said the crown prince had no prior knowledge of the killing of the Washington Post columnist at Riyadh's consulate in Istanbul last month.
After offering numerous contradictory explanations, Riyadh said last week Khashoggi had been killed and his body dismembered when negotiations to persuade him to return to Saudi Arabia failed.
,The blood of Khashoggi has not dried yet, the murderer bin Salman is not welcome in Tunisia, the country of democratic transition,, Neji Bghouri, the president of the journalists' syndicate, said.