The Criminal Chamber of the Tunis Court of First Instance sentenced three other defendants to the same term and also jailed a ministry official for 10 years.

The owner of the company importing the Italian waste, who is still at large, was sentenced in absentia to 15 years in prison. All were accused of harming people and public property, forgery and illegal importing of hazardous waste.

Chokri Belhassen, another former Tunisian environment minister, was acquitted.

Aroui was fired from his government position and arrested in December 2020 along with several officials from his ministry and the National Waste Management Agency as part of an investigation into the case.

The case dates back to July 2020 when 280 containers of household waste were illegally transported to Tunisia from Campania, in southern Italy, by the Italian company Sviluppo Risorse Ambientali, which falsely claimed that it was plastic waste intended for recycling.

More than 200 containers of waste were stored in the Tunisian port of Sousse, with the remainder left in a warehouse in Mourredine.

The case came to light after an investigation by a private Tunisian TV channel in November 2020 triggered an outcry in the country.

After a bilateral agreement, in February 2022, Tunisia returned the 213 containers stored in Sousse to Italy. The remaining containers, which were damaged by fire in December 2021, are still the subject of talks between the two countries.

A judicial inquiry into the case is still in progress.

The scandal provoked protests in Tunisia amid claims the country had become Italy’s “trash can.”

Moez Sinaoui, Tunisia’s ambassador in Italy, told Italian state broadcaster RAI that he is certain the waste remaining in Tunisia will eventually be returned to Campania.

Vincenzo De Luca, governor of Campania, told Arab News that “the region will do whatever is necessary to resolve the problem.”