BEIRUT: Lawyers for ousted Tunisian leader Zine Abidine Ben Ali, including a prominent Lebanese criminal defender, withdrew Monday from his trial in absentia on drugs and weapons charges, calling it a sham.

Ben Ali, whose overthrow has inspired revolutions across the Arab world, is now in Saudia Arabia. He has already been sentenced in absentia by a Tunisian court to 35 years prison for misappropriating public funds.

The fallen president says the current weapons charges against him are false, arguing that he received ceremonial weapons as gifts.

A statement from the Lebanese law firm representing him, issued to Reuters, read, "Today's trial ... violates all the norms of a just trial… It aims to show president Ben Ali as a smuggler of currencies, drugs and weapons.”

Akram Azoury, Ben Ali's lawyer at the firm, is experienced in high-profile criminal defense cases.

In 1999, Azoury defended former Lebanese petrol minister Chahe Barsoumian after he was accused of corruption and nepotism in petroleum contracts. In 2003, he defended Al-Madina Bank when it was facing money laundering charges. He was also the defense attorney for Lebanon’s head of general security Jamil Sayyed, who was held in prison for four years on suspicion of being involved in the assassination of former prime minister Rafik Hariri.