The Appeals Chamber of the “Special Tribunal for Lebanon” to try those responsible for the assassination of the late Prime Minister Rafik Hariri issued a ruling to convict two new members of Hezbollah, Hussein Oneissi and Hassan Marei, following it had acquitted them in a previous decision, to be added to the third member of the party, Salim. Ayyash, who had previously been convicted in absentia by the court in August 2020 and sentenced to life imprisonment.
Hezbollah has repeatedly refused to extradite the defendants or even acknowledge the court, which issued an international arrest warrant for Ayyash following his conviction. In January 2021, Ayyash’s defense team submitted a request to appeal the ruling once morest him, but the court rejected the request and announced that he might not appeal the verdict once morest him unless he surrendered.
The Appeals Chamber announced the rescission of the previous ruling that acquitted Oneissi and Marei, and said that the First Instance Chamber had committed errors in the law that invalidated the ruling and errors in facts that prevented justice from being served.
“We unanimously declare that they are guilty,” the president of the court said, and issued two arrest warrants once morest them, and the procedures for determining the punishment to be issued will now begin. Former Prime Minister Saad Hariri called on the Lebanese authorities to “work to arrest the convicts and hand them over to the court to implement the penalties prescribed for them.” He held Hezbollah responsible for covering up the crime of Rafik Hariri’s assassination, protecting criminals and evading the rule of international justice.
On the other hand, the Public Prosecutor of Mount Lebanon, Judge Ghada Aoun, issued a decision yesterday banning the travel of the chairmen of the boards of directors of five major banks in Lebanon: Salim Sfeir from “Bank of Beirut”, Samir Hanna from “Bank Audi” and Antoine Sehnawy from “Bank Audi” Societe Generale, Saad Al-Azhari for BLOM Bank, and Raya Al-Hassan for Bank Med.
Banking sources told Asharq Al-Awsat that the concerned banks “will review the political authorities, specifically Prime Minister Najib Mikati, noting that the background to the decision is ambiguous between the judicial, political and banking dimensions.”
… More
