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Mahmoud Abdel-Al	Mahmoud Abdel-Al	Al-Ahbash	Syria-Lebanon-Iran				20051031	Link
	Mahmoud Abdel-Al	al-Ahbash	Syria-Lebanon-Iran				20051028	Link

Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Judge refuses to release Hamdan, Azar

2005-11-16

Chief Lebanese Investigating Magistrate Elias Eid refused on Tuesday to release two former security chiefs awaiting trial for their possible role in the assassination of former Premier Rafik Hariri. Naji Boustani, the defense attorney of both Mustapha Hamdan and Raymond Azar, filed a motion on Saturday for his clients' release on grounds they were being detained on "suspicions and not hard evidence." Sounds like a routine motion, routinely rejected... Hamdan is the former head of the Presidential Guards, while Azar formerly ran the country's Military Intelligence department. The two officials were officially charged on September 3, along with two other former generals, with "murder, attempted murder and carrying out a terrorist act." I think there'd have been a fair amount of hell to pay had they been sprung. Time enough for the lawyers to muddy the waters... Eid also refused to release Mahmoud Abdel-Al, a senior official in the Islamic Al-Ahbash organization. Lead UN investigator Detlev Mehlis linked Abdel-Al to suspicious phone calls made shortly before and after Hariri's murder. Mehlis is due to arrive in Beirut by Wednesday night after a short vacation in Berlin.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

General spills the beans to Mehlis inquiry team

2005-10-31

BEIRUT: One of the four former security chiefs currently facing charges connected with the assassination of Rafik Hariri has started opening up to members of the international investigating committee, according to highly placed sources close to the inquiry. The general is said to be filling in many of the details of the involvement of Syrian intelligence officials and providing members of the United Nations team probing the murder of the former Lebanese Prime Minister with much new information. He who talks first gets to cut a deal The UN team, under German magistrate Detlev Mehlis, presented a report to the Security Council, which is due to discuss a follow-up resolution Monday. The four arrested former Lebanese security chiefs are Major General Jamil Sayyed, of the Surete Generale, Major General Ali Hajj, of the Internal Security Forces, Mustapha Hamdan, of the Presidential Guards, and Raymond Azar, of military intelligence. They are all known to be close to President Emile Lahoud although the four are not noted for being particularly close to each other. Which is why one of them is ratting out the others They were formally charged on Saturday, September 3 with "murder, attempted murder and carrying out a terrorist act." The talkative general has also been speaking to Mehlis' men about the possible involvement of other high-ranking members of the Lebanese political and military elite in the February 14 assassination. Meaning it wasn't just the Syrians, which comes as no suprise whatsoever... Mehlis himself has said in public that President Emile Lahoud is not a suspect in the events surrounding Hariri's murder. Meaning that particular link in the chain is broken... However, given the still not satisfactorily explained affair of the famous cellular call to the Presidential Palace at Baabda minutes before the explosion that killed Hariri and 22 others, it is still not clear how much, if anything, the president knew about the plot to kill Hariri. My guess is lots, but that might just be because Emile's such an unattractive toady. Hariri's falling out with the Assad mob was over having Emile foisted on them for yet another term... According to paragraph 200 of the Mehlis report, "Mahmoud Abdel-Al's telephone calls on 14 February are also interesting: he made a call minutes before the blast, at 1247 hrs, to the mobile phone of Lebanese President Emile Lahoud and at 1249 hrs had contact with Raymond Azar's mobile telephone." Abdel-Al, a member of Al-Ahbash (Association of Islamic Philanthropic Projects), is, like the former security chiefs, currently in custody charged with complicity in Hariri's murder. They've got a bunch of them in custody, with the exception of Emile and the Syrians. Prior to Mehlis showing up that had nobody in custody and the generals who're singing now were trying to hold on to their jobs. A Lahoud spokesman denied that Lahoud received a call from Abdel-Al, saying the number was one of several used by Baabda for calls from the public who wanted to make complaints or seek help. "Hello, Baabda? This is Abdel-Al. I gotta complaint: where the hell is that truck bomb? It ain't gone off yet!" According to a report in the daily An-Nahar, the number is not among those publicized by the palace as available for public use. So much for that alibi. The general is helping the Mehlis team to form a view, even if not definitive, of exactly how much Lahoud did know. If the guy singing is Azar, Emile may be gone pretty quick...

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Ahbash group at centre of Hariri probe

2005-10-28

The Lebanese Sunni Muslim group al-Ahbash, which describes itself a charitable organisation promoting Islamic culture, is at the centre of the UN probe into the murder of former prime minister Rafiq Hariri. "Charitable organization" means it lives off money donated by other people. "Promoting Islamic culture" usually involves explosives. I think we speak the language by now, thank you... The UN inquiry probing the assassination has named Ahmad Abdel-Al, believed to have been a top leader of Ahbash, as its key suspect over the February 14 car-bomb attack that killed Hariri and 20 others. The Lebanese authorities on Wednesday charged Ahmad and his brother Mahmoud — who is also a member of the Syrian-linked Ahbash — in connection with the murder. "Into the paddy wagon wit' yez!" According to the UN report released last week, Mahmoud telephoned President Emile Lahoud just minutes before the blast. Bad Emile! He was arrested after the report was released while his brother Ahmad was seized more than a month ago for illegal possession of arms in a case also involving a close aide to General Mustafa Hamdan, the head of Lahoud's presidential guard. Their brother Walid Abdel-Al, who also belongs to the the shadowy Ahbash, is a member of the guard. I'm wondering if anybody who's not a member of the Abdel-Al family belongs to Ahbash... According to the Mehlis report, a shop owned by an alleged member of the group with close ties to Ahmad sold six pre-paid mobile phone cards "which telephone records demonstrate were instrumental in the planning of the assassination." That'd be cousin Manny Abdel-Al, of course... "The investigation of the prepaid telephone cards is one of the most important leads in this investigation in terms of who was actually on the ground executing the assassination," the report said. The alleged implication of Ahbash in Hariri's assassination has put the spotlight on the group in Lebanon, where many believe the organisation to be a tool in the hands of Syrian intelligence. "We are innocent of all the accusations levelled against us," Ahbash spokesman Abdelkader Fakahani told AFP. "We are pure as snow," he said, adding that Ahbash had no links with Ahmad. Yup. Yup. Pure as the driven snow. And I, for one... ummm... don't believe him. "Ahmad Abdel Al's only mistake is to have known the person who lived in the alleged arms depot," he said in reference to an arms warehouse linked to the group and uncovered by the Lebanese army in July. Who was that? Pop? Such remarks have failed to convince many Lebanese including the country's top Sunni Muslim religious leader, Sheikh Rashid Kabbani, who has announced plans to regain control of several mosques that Ahbash seized in recent years. "During the Syrian occupation of Lebanon, the organisation took by force these mosques thanks to its ties to the Syrian intelligence services which gave it cover and protection," a source close to Kabbani told AFP. "That gravy train is now officially derailed." Ahbash first came to light in 1983 and gathered strength during the Syrian military presence in Lebanon, which ended only in April after strong international pressure following Hariri's killing. The departure of Syrian troops and intelligence operatives from Lebanon has untied many tongues and residents of the neighborhood near the group's headquarters in Beirut are now keen on expressing their views. Ahbash "recruited all sorts of people, including former convicts, the unemployed and failed students," one of them said. Pretty common with charitable organizations disseminating Islamic culture, isn't it? A former employee, Samira, charged that Ahbash "exploited poverty" to push ahead with its plans while her brother Saad insisted that the organisation "had nothing to do with Islam." "It only existed to back Emile Lahoud, Syria's man in Lebanon," Saad said.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Lebanon's pro-Syria president vows to stay on

2005-10-25

BEIRUT, Oct 25 (Reuters) - Lebanon's pro-Syrian President Emile Lahoud vowed on Tuesday to stay in office until the last minute of his term, defying fresh calls to resign after a U.N. probe implicated Syria in the murder of an ex-prime minister. "President Emile Lahoud confirms...his determination to continue shouldering his responsibilities until the last minute of his constitutional term," a statement from his office said. "Or the last flight out, whichever comes first." Lahoud has faced mounting pressure to step down since the February killing of Rafik al-Hariri threw Lebanon into its worst political crisis since the 1975-1990 civil war. With the U.N. investigation last week implicating Syrian security officials and their Lebanese allies in the murder, Lahoud is facing fresh calls to go. The inquiry reported that a man suspected of involvement in Hariri's murder had called Lahoud on his mobile phone minutes before the truck bomb that killed the former prime minister and 22 other people in Beirut. Lahoud's office has denied that he had any contact with the suspect, Mahmoud Abdel-Al, who has since been detained in connection with the assassination. Also detained are four pro-Syrian generals including Republican Guard chief Mustapha Hamdan, a close aide of Lahoud. The president's original six-year term was extended last year through a constitutional amendment to allow him to remain in office until 2007. But some Lebanese deputies say it was only passed under intense Syrian pressure. Syrian forces withdrew from Lebanon in April, ending a 29-year presence, amid local protest and international outcry over Hariri's murder. Elections in May-June returned a parliament that has been critical of Syria, leaving Lahoud increasingly isolated.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

New wave of arrests in Lebanon after UN report

2005-10-24

As Lebanon and the world prepare themselves for UN Chief Investigator Detlev Mehlis' briefing to the United Nations Security Council Tuesday on his controversial report on the assassination of former Premier Rafik Hariri, a new wave of related arrests has been carried out. Mehlis was subject to heavy questioning from the international media at a news conference he held Friday to explain why his report was released in two different versions, one citing the names of top Syrian officials, including the brother and brother-in-law of Syrian President Bashar Assad, and the other with them deleted. The German prosecutor, who left unsatisfied media hunger for the real reason behind the deleted parts of his report, issued a statement after the conference saying: "I established a rule that any person named in witness testimony should not be named in the report unless that person has been charged with a crime related to the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri." Despite that, Beirut MP Saad Hariri, son of the slain premier, said in televised speech from his residence in Saudi Arabia: "The investigation's report is a major first step in uncovering the truth. We look forward to continuing chapters toward justice, which alone will be the source of total comfort for the Lebanese people." The leader of the Future parliamentary bloc added: "The culprits who planned this terrorist crime and participated in executing and covering it up will face, God willing, the punishment they deserve." Also on Saturday, the Cabinet discussed the Mehlis report, which it said was based on "strong facts and a high level of professionalism." The Cabinet called on Syria to cooperate with the investigation, but Information Minister Ghazi Aridi said the probe "will not affect ties with Damascus. Lebanon's excellent relations with Syria must not be affected or regress under any circumstances." "No matter how many of us they kill. Unless it's me." On Sunday, Ahmad Jibril, leader of the pro-Syrian Palestinian Front for the Liberation of Palestine, General Command, who was named in the report as a possible suspect who plotted the assassination with Syrian and Lebanese officers, slammed Mehlis' investigating techniques. Jibril said Mehlis had never approached him or his group for a statement as he did with other people who were named by "supposed witnesses." "This report is not professional and doesn't include any ethical standard of work nor the objectivity it should have," he said. Jibril added: "I have never met any of the Syrian or Lebanese officers who Mehlis' witness claimed I did." "Never hoid of 'em. Yez got nuttin' on me, coppers!" He said the accusation "aims at disarming Palestinian factions, including ours." Meanwhile, a Lebanese presidential spokesman refuted on Sunday media allegations that President Emile Lahoud had refused to meet with Mehlis. He also commented on a paragraph in the report claiming that, three minutes before the blast that killed Hariri, Lahoud had received a call on his cellular phone from a mobile used by suspects in the case. "The cellular phone in the president's office is one of several lines known to everyone and on which the president's office receives calls from citizens and politician making complaints or appointment requests," he said. "So if the call was made on one of the lines in the president's office that does not mean the call was made to the president." The phone call was made by a Mahmoud Abdel Al, an official in the Islamic Al-Ahbash group, according to the report. According to judicial sources, Lebanese authorities arrested Mahmoud Abdel Al late Saturday on orders from State Prosecutor Said Mirza. Despite some reports that the arrest is the first in connection with Hariri's murder since publication of the report, security sources confirmed to The Daily Star that a State Security general, Faisal al-Rashid, and several military officers were detained early Friday, shortly after the report was issued to the press. The report had cited Al's brother, Ahmad Abdel Al, as a key figure in the assassination plot. Ahmad is currently being held for illegal arms dealing, after the authorities found a large number of weapons in a warehouse belonging to him. Security sources also said four men were arrested Saturday on charges of carrying out terrorist acts, including explosions, under orders from former Syrian intelligence chief in Lebanon General Jamaa Jamaa. The four men are being held for questioning. Eleven Lebanese officials were reported to be banned from traveling outside the country, although there is no confirmation of this. The Future Movement staged a demonstration Sunday near Hariri's grave in Martyrs' Square, demanding those named in Mehlis' report be punished for involvement in assassinating Hariri. Bilal Hatab, head of the Association of Graduates from the Hariri Foundation, called on everyone who took part in the March 14 demonstration, (also known as the Cedar revolution), to stand united. Nader Naqib, spokesman for a group of youth organizations, demanded the setting up of an international court to try the culprits.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Beirut arrests pro-Syrian after Hariri report

2005-10-23

Lebanon on Sunday arrested a member of a pro-Syrian Islamist group, taking its first action in response to a UN report that pointed to Syrian involvement in the February assassination of Rafiq Hariri, the country's former prime minister. As the US and Britain kept up the pressure on Syria ahead of a meeting at the UN Security Council on Tuesday, a politician close to the Syrian government said Russia and China, permanent members of the Council, had given assurances to Damascus that they would block punitive measures against Syria. Syrian officials ratcheted up the anti-Lebanese rhetoric, accusing anti-Syrian elements in Lebanon of having influenced the report. But they held out the prospect of co-operating with the inquiry, led by Detlev Mehlis, the German prosecutor. The Mehlis report, released last Thursday, said there was "converging evidence" pointing at "both Lebanese and Syrian involvement" and called for a deeper probe of the Syrian role. It also cited a witness account of meetings at the presidential palace in Damascusto discuss the assassination. The witness claimed participants at the meeting included President Bashar al-Assad's brother Maher and his brother-in-law, Assef Chawkat, who is also the head of Syrian military intelligence. In Beirut, the Lebanese government at the weekend issued a statement fully supporting the findings of the UN team. Saad Hariri, son of the murdered leader, called for an international court to try the perpetrators. Lebanese police arrested a member of the Sunni Muslim al-Ahbash group, Mahmoud Abdel-Al. He was mentioned in the report as having made a call to the mobile telephone of Emile Lahoud, Lebanon's pro-Syrian president, minutes before the blast that killed Hariri and 22 others in the centre of Beirut. In Damascus, George Jabbour, a Syrian member of parliament who is close to the government, told the Financial Times that Russia and China had given assurances that they would block punitive measures at the Security Council. Riad Daoudi, an adviser to the Foreign Ministry who is in charge of liaising with the UN investigation, said the Damascus government would study any request to interview Syrians outside the country, one of the UN team's key demands. At a press conference, Mr Daoudi insisted that "figures opposed to Syria in Lebanon" had influenced the UN report, an allegation that he repeated several times. Condoleezza Rice, the US secretary of state, yesterday urged a "firm" international reaction. Jack Straw, the UK foreign secretary, said the findings were "very serious" for Syria. "What we do know is that the report indicates that people of a high level of this Syrian regime were implicated," he said. The US and its European allies are considering measures against Syria, possibly including sanctions on individuals named in the report. Pressure for strong action could further increase with the release, perhaps as early as today, of another report that looks at Damascus' compliance with UN resolution 1559, passed last year and calling for an end to outside interference in Lebanon. Israel's Haaretz newspaper yesterday said it had obtained a copy of the new report, which it claimed would indicate that "Syria's indirect military intervention and direct intelligence intervention in Lebanon continues, including arms shipments to various militias". UN officials, however, denied the Haaretz account. Additional reporting by Roula Khalaf in London and Mark Turner in New York

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Lebanese in streets demand resignation of Lahoud, Assad

2005-10-21

BEIRUT/NEW YORK: Two thousand people returned to Lebanon's Martyrs' Square Friday, in front of the tomb of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri in Beirut, to call for the resignation of the presidents of Syria and Lebanon. The protests came after the publication of a damning UN report into the murder of Hariri, which pointed to the involvement of Lebanese and Syrian security services. "Down with [Syrian President Bashar] Assad," and "Resign [Lebanese President Emile] Lahoud," shouted the demonstrators, brandishing Lebanese flags. The demonstrators had responded to a call from youth movements linked to the anti-Syrian faction of Hariri's son Saad, which is the largest grouping in Lebanon's Parliament. From New York, Mehlis said that the "editorial process" carried out under his directions may have resulted in two differing versions of his report on the investigation into the assassination of Hariri. U.S. Ambassador to the UN John Bolton commented on the matter Friday: "I have seen several versions of the report and at the moment I don't understand why there are several versions of the report." Mehlis said during a news conference at UN headquarters in New York on Friday that "we produced a number of versions of the report, and I was just informed and made aware that one of several earlier drafts had made its way to the media." "I think this is distracting from the main point of the report itself," Bolton said regarding the differences in the leaked reports, "the substance of which doesn't change no matter what version you have or how good you are at software." According to Mehlis, "the official version of the report is the one that was submitted to [UN Secretary General Kofi] Annan and transmitted by him to the Security Council." He continued: "I want to make it clear that any differences between earlier versions and the final version of the text resulted from the editorial process carried out by my team under my direction and are my responsibility." The controversy concerned omitted names of top Syrian and Lebanese officials, whom, according to a witness statement included in a version apparently never meant for the public, had "decided to assassinate Hariri." The names of Maher Assad (brother of Syrian President Bashar Assad), Assef Shawkat (Assad's brother-in-law), Syrian intelligence generals Hassan Khalil and Bahjat Suleyman, and Jamil al-Sayyed (head of the Lebanese Surete Generale), and Mustafa Hamdan (head of Lebanese Presidential Guards) were deleted in a version leaked to the press. He said the names were left out because of "a presumption of innocence" and so as not to give the impression that the allegations made by a witness were "an established fact." Mehlis also denied allegations by the press that the changes were made during his meeting with Annan. Yet, the changes appeared to have been made at the time when he met the Annan, according to computer printouts of the unedited report. "None of these changes were influenced by anyone," Mehlis said. Mehlis is expected to brief the Security Council on the report Friday. Meanwhile, President Emile Lahoud denied in a statement issued Friday that he received any phone calls on the day Hariri was murdered from Ahmad Abdel-Al, a member of the Sunni fundamentalist group Al-Ahbash. Lahoud further considered allegations that he was linked to the murder as "groundless and void," and said he had been targeted by a campaign to mar his reputation. Lahoud added that he "has complete faith in the Lebanese judiciary," and stressed "the importance of inflicting severe punishment against the perpetrators" of Hariri's killing. Mehlis' report had stated that Abdel-Al called Lahoud shortly before the assassination, and depicted Abdel-Al as "a key figure in any ongoing investigation." Abdel-Al is currently under arrest on illegal weapons charges, while Mustafa Hamdan's brother, Majed, remains at large in the same case. Al-Ahbash denied the allegations Friday that one of its officials, Mahmoud Abdel-Al, brother of Ahmad, had any involvement in Hariri's assassination. The Palestinian Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC) also refuted allegations in the Mehlis report that its leader Ahmad Jibril was connected to the assassination. "We are ready to present any of our members if he was proven to have a hand in the terrorist crime which we condemn," the faction said in a statement released Friday. Meanwhile, security sources said that State Security General Faisal al-Rashid and several military officers were detained early Friday morning, shortly after the report was leaked to the press. Rumors also circulated Friday that former MP Nasser Qandil had been placed under house arrest, but a judicial source said there was "nothing against Qandil, so far." - With agencies

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