Sehnaoui: Had There Been a Real State, Rifi Would've Been in Jail, Not a Lecturer in Sovereignty
Caretaker Telecommunications Minister Nicolas Sehnaoui on Tuesday hit back at former Internal Security Forces chief Maj. Gen. Ashraf Rifi, stressing that the ministry abides by the cabinet's decisions regarding the handing over of telecom data to security agencies.
The ministry “used to deliver the data whenever authorized by the cabinet and it withheld the data only when the council of ministers asked it to do so,” said Sehnaoui in a statement issued by his press office.
On Monday evening, Rifi told MTV that slain ISF Intelligence Bureau head Wissam al-Hasan had evaded four assassination attempts before he was murdered on October 19, 2012 due to “lack of cooperation in the issue of telecom data.”
Rifi accused Sehnaoui of being accomplice in the assassination “because he withheld the telecom data from investigators.”
But the minister stressed that “security agencies were receiving the complete telecom data everyday during the past three years, including during the period of the assassination of martyr Major General Wissam al-Hasan and the other incidents.”
“Had anything suspicious been recorded, Maj. Gen. Rifi would not have hesitated for a second to publicize it during his command of the ISF,” Sehnaoui said, reminding that “the ministry hands over telecom data to security agencies three times per week in line with an agreement between the ministry and these agencies and according to the mechanism stipulated by the law, knowing that the ministry bypasses this mechanism during extraordinary situations and delivers the data even at a verbal request.”
“Rifi's accusation that the telecom minister is a front for Hizbullah is rejected, especially that it was issued by an officer who has become accustomed to working for all types of regional and international foreign intelligence agencies,” the minister added, describing the rest of Rifi's remarks as “political propaganda.”
“Had the state possessed any prestige, the retired general would have been in jail, not a lecturer in state authority, virtue and sovereignty,” Sehnaoui added.
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