Activists, women and human right groups staged Tuesday a sit-in outside Beirut’s Justice Palace to protest the court’s ruling issued in Manal Assi’s case.
The rally, organized by local NGO KAFA (Enough) Violence and Exploitation, called for justice “for Manal Assi and all women.”
Head of the Lebanese Council of Women (LCW) Iqbal Doughan stated that “the case of Manal Assi is not an individual one, but is a cause that concerns all the Lebanese women,” pointing out that Assi was killed twice, once by her husband and the second time by the judiciary.
Doughan stressed that the law was put to serve the interest of humans and not to ease their killing.
“The right to life is the first human right and we as women stick to this right along with all our other rights,” she added.
For his part, State Prosecutor Judge Samir Hammoud told LBCI that he had received the file of Assi and would examine it.
In July, the Judge presiding over Beirut’s Criminal Court, Helene Iskandar, granted Assi's husband a mitigating excuse and reduced his sentence from death penalty to five years in prison, including the period of his detention, after considering that the killer was in a state of rage when he committed the crime.
KAFA released a statement on the case last week explaining that the deadline to appeal the July 14 verdict ends Tuesday.
The group reported that the sentence was based on Article 252 of the Penal Code, which allows for reduced punishment if a crime occurred as a result of extreme rage caused by “dangerous and wrongful action committed by the victim.”
Resigned Justice Minister Ashraf Rifi sent to the Public Prosecution of Cassation last week a memo whereby he requested to bring the ruling issued against the husband of Assi before the Court of Cassation, should the tribunal saw any legal reasons for it.
Lebanese citizen Manal Assi, 33, was one of the victims of domestic violence.
She was cruelly tortured by her husband for more than 2 hours before he took her to al-Maqased Hospital where she died of her wounds on February 5, 2014.
Two months later, an indictment was issued against her husband Mohammad Nouheili, convicting him of murder, and sentencing him to death in accordance with the Article 549 of the Penal Code.
The said article stipulates that intentional murder shall be punished by death penalty.