12 Charged with Abducting Syrian Defectors, Handing Them to Regime

State Commissioner to the Military Court Judge Saqr Saqr on Wednesday charged 12 people with “luring” and “abducting” defected Syrian soldiers and handing them to their country's regime.

“Saqr filed a lawsuit against 12 people – including 3 detainees of whom one is a serviceman – on charges of luring soldiers defected from the Syrian regime, kidnapping them and handing them to Syrian authorities in return for personal benefits,” state-run National News Agency said.

The fate of those who were handed over remains unknown, NNA noted.

Saqr charged the suspects with offenses that are punishable by hard labor and referred them to an examining military magistrate, the agency added.

A judicial source told Agence France-Presse that the detainees -- three Lebanese nationals including a soldier -- were arrested Tuesday.

"Three people were arrested in Lebanon's Bekaa Valley, but there are nine more in this group," he said.

According to the judicial source, the kidnappers had handed the defectors over to Syrian authorities in exchange for money.

On Monday, the Internal Security Forces issued a statement announcing the arrest of three people on charges of “abducting a defected Syrian officer and two soldiers and handing them to members of the Syrian regime.”

“They also confessed to attempting to kidnap a defected officer,” the ISF added.

The statement said the men were arrested in the wake of “several recent kidnappings of officers and soldiers defected from the Syrian army in the North region.”

It identified two of the detainees as 29-year-old M. S. and 36-year-old M. M. – both Lebanese – and A. K., 32.

Search and arrest warrants were also issued for three other Lebanese nationals, the ISF said.

In December, seven people were arrested for kidnapping Syrian dissidents and transferring them to the regime in Damascus.

Lebanon hosts around 1.2 million Syrian refugees, including dissidents and soldiers who fled the four-year war in their country.

Y.R.