Tunisia was the hope of the Arab spring. Now my father could face the death penalty for his words | Soumaya Ghannoushi

The president, Kais Saied, has turned our country into a dictatorship, while Europe looks the other way

Historic" - that is how Tunisia's president, Kais Saied, described his meeting with Syria's Bashar al-Assad on the eve of the Arab League summit in Jeddah earlier this month. Snaps of him standing alongside al-Assad and Egypt's Abdel Fatah al-Sisi during the summit were widely shared around the region, signalling Tunisia's return to the grand old club of Arab dictatorships.

For all their internecine conflicts and rivalries, hidden and visible, Arab leaders are again united around one sacred goal: aborting their people's aspirations for change. Muammar Gaddafi, Hosni Mubarak and Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali may no longer be on the stage, but their spirit lives on in a new generation.

Soumaya Ghannoushi is a British-Tunisian writer and researcher specialising in the Middle East and north Africa