One protester died and several were injured when Tunisian Islamists defied a ban on their demonstration and clashed with police yesterday.

Police arrested dozens of people in the Ettadamen neighbourhood

The 27-year-old man was killed in the violence in the capital Tunis which continued into the evening, the state news agency said. A Reuters witness saw several others injured at the protest in support of the Islamist Ansar al-Sharia group.

In the central city of Kairouan, where tens of thousands of members of Ansar al-Sharia had been due to attend the main rally, protesters threw stones at police, who fired teargas in response.

Ansar al-Sharia is the most radical Islamist group to emerge in Tunisia since secular dictator Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali was toppled in 2011, and poses a test to the authority of the moderate Islamist government.

While the situation in Kairouan had calmed down by yesterday evening, clashes continued in Tunis where police arrested dozens of people in the Ettadamen neighbourhood where Islamists chanted: “The rule of the tyrant should fall.”

Police fired teargas and shots into the air to disperse some 500 stone-throwing protesters, some of whom set fire to cars, lowered the Tunisian flag and replaced it with a black al-Qaeda banner.

The state news agency identified the dead man as Moez Dahmani but did not say how he died.

Buses and the subway stopped working and shops in the neighbourhood were closed, while military aircraft patrolled overhead. Clashes spread to two other areas of the capital.

Tunisia was the first country to stage an “Arab Spring” uprising, inspiring similar revolutions in Egypt and Libya.

The new government is led by a moderate Islamist party, Ennahda, but hardline Islamist Salafists are seeking a broader role for religion.