2024-04-09T10:55:51+00:00
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/ The Lebanese authorities arrested 7 Syrians suspected of involvement in the killing of a Lebanese Forces party official whose body was found in Syria, a judicial and military source told AFP on Tuesday.
The military source said that the Syrian authorities handed over to the Lebanese intelligence services three suspects in the killing of Pascal Suleiman, who was kidnapped in the Jbeil region (north) last Sunday.
The case sparked an uproar in Lebanon, where the Christian Lebanese Forces party, which opposes the Iran-backed Shiite Hezbollah, considered the crime “a political assassination until proven otherwise.”
Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah denied, in a televised speech on Monday, that his party was involved in the kidnapping, considering that those accusing him were only provoking sectarian strife.
The judicial source told Agence France-Presse, “The detainees’ testimonies unanimously agreed that the only motive for the crime was the theft of” Suleiman’s car.
The Lebanese Army indicated in a statement on Monday evening, “It became clear during the investigation with most of the Syrian gang members involved in the kidnapping that the kidnapped person was killed by them while they were trying to steal his car in the Jbeil area.”
The judicial source noted that the detainees “confessed that they beat him in the head and face with pistol butts to make him stop resisting them, and then they put him in the trunk of his car (…) and entered Syria.”
He added, “When they arrived in Syrian territory, it became clear to them that he had died.”
The body was found in Syrian territory, according to the military source, who pointed out that the suspects belong to a gang that carried out many thefts of luxury cars in Lebanon.
For its part, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights told Agence France-Presse that the body of a man with specifications matching the description of Pascal Suleiman was found in the Syrian province of Homs.
Homs Governorate, close to the Lebanese border, is under the control of Syrian regime forces, and Lebanese Hezbollah enjoys influence there.
The military source indicated that the Lebanese authorities will receive the body on Tuesday.
The news of Pascal Suleiman and then his killing sparked anger in Jbeil, where hundreds of Lebanese Forces party supporters blocked roads on Monday evening.
Some of them assaulted Syrian passers-by, as video clips spread on social media showed.
The Lebanese Forces considered in a statement that “the martyrdom of comrade Pascal Suleiman was a murder that was carried out intentionally, intentionally, and with premeditation and design,” but it asked its supporters to “leave the squares and open the roads.”
Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati denounced the crime in a statement issued by his office, stressing “the continuation of investigations to uncover the full circumstances behind the kidnapping and those involved in it and the assassination of the kidnapped person and bring them to justice.”
Mikati added, “In these difficult circumstances, we call on everyone to exercise restraint, be wise, and not be drawn into rumors and emotions.”