Three Prominent Members Expelled from Free Patriotic Movement

Prominent Free Patriotic Movement members Ziad Abs, Naim Aoun and Antoine Nasrallah were on Friday expelled from the movement.

“The FPM's juristic council has informed the three activists of the decision to expel them from the movement,” media reports said.

In remarks to al-Jadeed television, Abs, a key official in Beirut's Ashrafieh area, confirmed that he has been expelled from the FPM along with the two other members.

He also told LBCI TV that his latest televised appearances are the reason behind his expulsion.

The FPM had accused the three members of “raising the FPM's crises in the media,” according to An Nahar newspaper.

Abs, Aoun and Nasrallah for their part had informed the movement's juristic council that they would not attend their so-called “trial” seeing as they “did not violate the movement's bylaws as the leadership has claimed.”

Media reports had said in May that the FPM leadership was studying the possibility of expelling some 20 members, including leading official Ziad Abs, for “rebelling against movement decisions.”

The dispute had first erupted over Abs' opposition to the FPM's alliance in Beirut's municipal elections with al-Mustaqbal Movement. The dispute pitted him against former FPM minister Nicolas Sehnaoui.

Abs was reportedly not consulted over the alliance.

FPM founder MP Michel Aoun had vowed to “hold accountable” those responsible for the so-called “revolt” within the FPM, a source close to FPM chief Jebran Bassil told al-Liwaa newspaper in May.