Charbel Meets Ozeldiz, Vows State Protection to Turkish Citizens
إقرأ هذا الخبر بالعربية
Caretaker Interior Minister Marwan Charbel said Saturday that the Lebanese authorities will protect Turkish nationals and set free a pilot and co-pilot kidnapped by gunmen a day earlier.
“We are protecting Turkish (citizens) in Lebanon in addition to all the people,” Charbel said after welcoming the Turkish Ambassador, Inan Ozeldiz, at his residence in Hazmieh.
Charbel vowed to secure the release of the abducted Turkish Airlines crew members when security forces locate their whereabouts.
“We will bring them when we know where they are,” he said.
“Lebanon rejects kidnappings and the state is exerting all efforts to secure their release,” he added.
The ambassador left without making any statement.
Six gunmen intercepted a van carrying the Turkish Airlines employees from Rafik Hariri International Airport to a hotel in the Ain Mreisseh seafront at dawn Friday, kidnapping the two pilots - Murat Akpinar and Murat Agca - but leaving the four other crew members behind.
The attack prompted Turkey to issue a travel warning urging its citizens to avoid unnecessary travel to Lebanon and those already present in the country to leave.
Charbel telephoned President Michel Suleiman on Saturday to brief him on the result of his meeting with Ozeldiz, who also met with al-Musatqbal bloc leader MP Fouad Saniora.
Saniora hoped that the kidnapping would not affect ties between Lebanon and Turkey.
He condemned the abduction, saying it had bad political and economic repercussions on Lebanon.
10 August 2013, 18:22
15
Minister Charbel must be a joke. He vows to protect Turkish citizens in Lebanon, when he can't even protect Lebanese citizens. What is he going to do, attach 10 soldiers to every one of them?
10 August 2013, 22:46
20
banima3roof, read this 3mol ma3rouf:
www.albawaba.com/editorchoice/servants-or-soldiers-lebanon-shrinks-politicians-posses-508824
11 August 2013, 08:31
00
They did it for march8 people too.
Point is, politicians from both camps have way more officers than the LAW permits them to have, DOZENS more, and treat them like maids and servants making them prepare their nargilehs and doing errands and grocery shopping and such. Finally got to use their training to good use eh.
'bout time they lowered the number of officers so it coincides with the law, and also lowers these pompous politician's haughtiness, sense of self-entitlement, and self-righteousness.
Read the link before making ignorant comments please.
10 August 2013, 18:49
42
Isn't also a joke when Israeli commandos kidnaps & even murder Lebanese citizens inside our own territory ?
Signed Wolf.
11 August 2013, 01:38
02
Definitely. But at least the Israelis have the courage and honour to do it overtly, and not hide underground and bull.S their own people about what they had done. 3ala ma yabdù, el-3adùw tili3 âshraf min âshraf el nès.
11 August 2013, 02:06
20
Courage? Honor? They'd do none of those things if they didn't have the US on a chain. The Middle East would obliterate it, but good ol' US of A endorses Israel's violations of international law, and its sycophant followers and nations pay no mind to it as a result. There's nothing courageous or honorable about what Israelis do to Arabs.
10 August 2013, 19:36
12
“We will bring them when we know where they are,”... I am sure the Turkish ambassador was reassured by that statement.
10 August 2013, 22:11
03
This is why he left without making any statements, but I am sure he left shaking his head in disbelief.
11 August 2013, 00:19
12
Next the illustrious Mansour will tell the Turkish ambassador, that it was the fault of the pilots for getting in the van.
10 August 2013, 21:05
00
You Lebanese are useless...u can not even protect each other u wanna protect Turks....r u idiots...some countries should disappear from the map of this planet...good I do not live in LEBANON anymore.
10 August 2013, 21:50
00
I suggest that all the Turks in Lebanon wear a collar stamped with the words: MADE IN TURKEY.
11 August 2013, 01:30
11
So the kidnappers knew which of the six in the van were the pilots, and which were just crew members. Remind me again, who runs the cameras at the Airport? Who invaded Beirut in May '08 to reinstall their agent as head of the Airport? Khalleena ma nitda77ak 3a 7alna: we all know who's behind the kidnapping. And now with Turkey - who has been outspoken in denouncing Baschar's mass-murder spree - also issuing a travel ban on Lebanon, the Syrio-Iranian Occupation Force has finally got what it wanted: the only "tourist" money that's coming into Lebanon is from Syrians. Don't you just love how "business as usual" manifests itself on our occupied Lebanese soil?
12 August 2013, 07:00
10
____-wolf-____ You are at it again with your nonsense.
"high profile diplomat in a Dubai Five Star Hotel"
To be a diplomat, you need to represent a country.Just what country did he represent? Hamastan ? Hizballahland ?
13 August 2013, 17:19
00
He represented the will of the people whose lands have been unlawfully usurped by a foreign entity. Simply because the lands haven't been recognized thanks chiefly to the US, does not mean he doesn't represent said lands. Your post is a shameful disregard for human justice, and an even more shameful stance on the Palestinian issue. The day will come though when you will realize the error of your ways, no doubt.
