On 9 October the Tunisian presidential candidate Nabil Karoui was freed after a Tunisian appeals court’s sentence. He had been detained since August for an ongoing trial on money laundering and tax evasion which prevented him from directly participating in the electoral campaigns ahead of the first round of presidential elections and the parliamentary elections. Despite this limitation, he made it to the second round of Presidential elections (15.6% of votes) and his party Heart of Tunisia is now the second political force in the new Tunisian parliament with 38 seats. After the Court’s decision Karoui’s spokesman Hatem Mliki declared that the country was “in a very difficult moment […] which really threatened Tunisian democracy”. Karoui’s detention had triggered criticism. Tunisian interim President Mohamed Ennaceur had said that what happened was damaging the credibility of the elections and the Independent High Authority for Elections had warned that Karoui could have appealed against the results considering his inability to fully act during the campaign. On 5 October the other presidential candidate Kais Saied had announced that he would stop campaigning to avoid unfair electoral competition over his opponent.