Fabius Contacts Berri, Assuring him that 11 Pilgrims are Doing Well
Speaker Nabih Berri received on Saturday a message from French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius on the case of the 11 kidnapped Lebanese pilgrims.
He informed the speaker that the 11 pilgrims are alive and doing well.
He added that consultations are ongoing with his Turkish counterpart Ahmet Davutoglu to resolve the matter.
Earlier on Saturday, the Turkish Ambassador to Lebanon Inan Ozyildiz met with Foreign Minister Adnan Mansour to discuss the abduction, saying that he has no new information on the pilgrims.
They were kidnapped in May as they were returning to Lebanon through Syria from a pilgrimage in Iran.
The pilgrims were thought to be held in the Syrian region of Aazaz before Syrian regime forces targeted the region with airstrikes on Wednesday, raising questions about their fate.
Ozyildiz said that the pilgrims are still in Syria, denying claims that they had entered Turkey.
He said that Turkey would not have kept them in its custody had they entered its territory.
“Turkey has not forgotten this case and they have been in Syria for three months,” he continued.
“We informed Mansour that Turkey is doing all it can to ensure their release,” stressed the ambassador.
On whether negotiations are being held between Turkey and the kidnappers, he remarked: “I am not aware of any negotiations, but contacts are ongoing.”
“We are not a direct side involved in the affair,” Ozyildiz stressed.
Meanwhile, head of the committee following up on case of the kidnapped pilgrims, Sheikh Abbas Zoghaib accused Turkish intelligence of playing a role in their ongoing abduction.
He urged during a press conference the Turkish ambassador to resolve the case before the case of the Turkish nationals kidnapped in Lebanon is resolved.
“The Turkish case will be settled as soon as the Lebanese one is,” he stated.
The military wing of al-Meqdad clan announced on Wednesday that it had abducted over 20 supporters of the Free Syrian Army, as well as a Turkish national, in retaliation to the abduction of Hassan al-Meqdad in Syria last Sunday.
On Thursday, unknown assailants abducted Turkish national Abd Basset Orssolane from the Choueifat region.
The clan’s spokesman Maher al-Meqdad had stated that the family’s military wing has nothing to do with the abduction.
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