Captors Threaten to Kill 7 Servicemen if Life Sentences of Roumieh Inmates Executed
The captors of the Lebanese troops and policemen threatened Sunday to murder seven of them if Lebanese authorities enforce recent life imprisonment sentences against a number of Islamist inmates at the Roumieh prison.
“The wife of the abductee Khaled Moqbel Hassan received a phone call from the captors, who threatened to kill 7 servicemen if life imprisonment sentences against 5 Roumieh Islamist inmates were not revoked,” LBCI TV reported in the evening.
Earlier, al-Jadeed television said a brother of hostage soldier Abbas Msheik received a similar phone call.
As the news broke out, the families of the captive troops started burning tires at the Riad al-Solh Square in central Beirut, where they have been observing a sit-in since several weeks.
The emir of the Qaida-linked al-Nusra Front in Syria's Qalamun region has refused to discuss the Lebanese cabinet's response regarding the demands of the group to release the abducted soldiers and policemen.
According to the Kuwaiti al-Qabas newspaper, the so-called emir informed the Qatari-appointed mediator, Syrian national Ahmed al-Khatib, that the group rejects to tackle the Lebanese proposal.
Al-Nusra and the Islamic State groups have been holding several troops and policemen hostage since August 2, when they overran the northeastern border town of Arsal and engaged in bloody clashes with the army.
The two groups have since executed three troops and threatened to murder more hostages if Lebanese authorities don't fulfill their demands.
Nusra said that the three-month hostage crisis would end if 10 inmates held at Lebanese prisons would be freed for each hostage or seven Lebanese inmates and 30 female prisoners held in Syria would be released for each abducted soldier and policeman or if five Lebanese and 50 women inmates would be freed.
The group added that the swap with the prisoners held at Syrian prisons should take place in Turkey or Qatar, while the exchange with the Lebanese authorities should take place on the outskirts of Arsal.
The cabinet had previously totally rejected any swap deal with the jihadists.
Meanwhile, some families of the abducted servicemen continued to visit their sons. The family of captive soldiers Mohammed Youssef and Hussein Ammar have recently met with them separately in the outskirts of Arsal, a day after the family of soldier Khaled Hassan also met with him.
Media reports had said that the Islamist captors of the servicemen have agreed to allow their loved ones to visit them.
According to the pan-Arab daily al-Hayat published on Sunday, the mother of Ammar, his brother and uncle and the wife of Youssef and his mother headed to Arsal on Saturday morning to meet with the two abducted soldiers.
Gunmen reportedly transferred the two families to meet their loved ones.
Ammar informed his family during the 10-minute meeting that the jihadists are forcing them to dig tunnels, adding that the gunmen accused Hizbullah of impeding the negotiations.
He added that strikes by Hizbullah, the Lebanese army and the Syrian army are forcing the jihadists to continuously change their whereabouts.
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