TUNIS, Tunisia - Police in Tunisia cracked down Sunday on key allies of the ousted president, placing two high-ranking officials under house arrest and detaining the head of a well-known private TV station for allegedly trying to slow down the country's nascent steps toward democracy.
The measures against former cronies and supporters of deposed President Zine El-Abidine Ben-Ali came amid continued street protests in the North African country's capital, Tunis, and efforts by the tenuous interim government to heed the incessant groundswell of opposition to his old guard.
Hundreds of protesters — many from Tunisia's provinces south of the capital — rallied in Tunis to press on with demands that holdovers of Ben Ali's repressive 23-year regime be kept out of power.