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AFP
Tunis
Tunisian President Beji Caid Essebsi held talks Saturday with political parties, unions and employers to discuss means to overcome a week of unrest triggered by austerity measures.
The North African country has been shaken by a wave of protests over poverty and unemployment during which hundreds have been arrested before the unrest tapered off.
The two-hour crisis meeting at the presidential palace brought together Essebsi, representatives of political parties, the powerful UGTT trade union and the UTICA employers federation.
"We discussed the general situation in the country and the reforms, especially socio-economic, that must be adopted to overcome the current problems,"UTICA head Wided Bouchamaoui told reporters.
Although no concrete decisions were announced, Noureddine Taboubi, the secretary general of UGTT, said measures"must be adopted"to aid needy families and boost social care in the North African state.
Proposals were raised"to pull out of this tension"without scrapping a contested 2018 budget, said Rached Ghannouchi, head of the Islamist movement Ennahdha in Tunisia's ruling coalition, without elaborating.
UTICA and UGTT shared the 2015 Nobel Peace Prize for their work during Tunisia's transition towards democracy after the revolution.
The demonstrations broke out ahead of Sunday's seventh anniversary of the toppling of veteran dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali in a revolt that sparked uprisings across the Arab region.
The trigger of the protests on January 7 was the budget imposing tax hikes after a year of rising prices.
