Hariri: I Accuse Bashar Hafez Assad of Assassinating Brig. Gen. Wissam al-Hasan
Former Prime Minister Saad Hariri on Friday accused Syrian President Bashar Assad of ordering the assassination of Brig. Gen. Wissam al-Hasan, chief of the Intelligence Bureau of the Internal Security Forces, condemning the deadly bombing that hit the Ashrafiyeh district in Beirut as a “cowardly terrorist attack against all of Lebanon and all the Lebanese people.”
“I accuse Bashar Hafez Assad of assassinating Brig. Gen. Wissam al-Hasan,” said Hariri.
He described al-Hasan as "the guarantor of the security of the Lebanese."
In a statement he issued before news broke out that Hasan was among those killed by the blast, Hariri expressed his condolences to the families of the victims, demanding that the concerned authorities act with “utmost determination and speed to protect the citizens.”
“The cowardly terrorist attack which targeted Ashrafiyeh today is an attack against all of Lebanon and all the Lebanese people. It is a cowardly act against the country’s stability and security,” he said in a statement.
“As I extend my sincerest condolences to the families of the martyrs and my sincerest feelings of solidarity to the families of the wounded and all the people of Ashrafiyeh and Beirut, I demand that the concerned authorities act with utmost determination and speed, and exercise their duty to protect the citizens, their lives and belongings and to strike with an iron fist all those who try to tamper with Lebanon’s stability and security,” he added.
A powerful car bomb on Friday rocked a street adjacent to Sassine Square in Ashrafiyeh, leaving eight people dead and 78 people wounded, in the first such attack in the Lebanese capital since 2008, state-run National News Agency reported.
Source: Agence France Presse
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