The Tunisian government and a long-banned Islamic

The Tunisian government and a long-banned Islamic party both denounced the slaying of a Roman Catholic priest, while several hundred people gathered outside the French embassy in Tunis to demand the recall of France’s new ambassador.
The priest, Marek Marius Rybinski, was found Friday with his throat slit and stab wounds in the parking lot of a religious school in a Tunis suburb.
The slaying of the Polish priest was the first deadly attack on members of religious minorities since last month’s ouster of Tunisia’s autocratic president, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.
The Interior Ministry said the killing appeared to be the work of a “group of extremist terrorist fascists,’’ and vowed that those responsible for the “odious crime’’ would be punished.
The long-outlawed Ennahdha, or Renaissance, party called on authorities to “cast light on the real circumstances of this incident . . . before making accusations.’’
The statement, signed by the party’s leader, Rached Ghannouchi — who returned to Tunisia last month after decades in exile — urged “vigilance in order to ward off anything that could spark anarchy.’’
Ennahdha was considered an Islamic terrorist group and outlawed under Ben Ali, but is considered moderate by scholars.
At least 2,000 people staged a peaceful demonstration in central Tunis yesterday to denounce extremism and call for tolerance.
In another protest in the capital, several hundred people gathered yesterday outside the French embassy to demand that France recall its new ambassador, Boris Boillon.
The protesters denounced what they called Boillon’s “insulting behavior’’ at a news conference last week, though it was not clear what he said to anger them.