The trial of former Minister Michel Samaha was adjourned Thursday until November 26, since the defense attorneys did not review the videos recorded during Samaha’s interrogation as it was previously decided, due to changes in the court’s committee.
Samaha’s attorneys requested the telecommunications data of the former minister’s phone related to the period extending from February 09, 2012 until August 09, 2012, noting that the entire issue is an attempt to entrap Samaha, according to his Defense Attorney Sakher al-Hashem.
In this regard, al-Hashem called for the inclusion of the episode produced by Firas Hatoum and aired on LBCI on October 02, 2015 in the investigation, stressing the need to discuss its content.
During the said episode, Justice Minister Ashraf Rifi spoke of his relation with informant Miled Kfoury.
The court accepted the request, refusing however to discuss Rifi’s statements.
On May 13, the trial of former Information Minister Michel Samaha ended at the Military Court, and a verdict was issued sentencing him to four and a half years in prison, and stripping him of all civil rights.
The verdict also stipulates that his years of detention would be counted from the day he was incarcerated, leaving him to serve the remaining 11 months in prison according to Samaha’s defense attorney.
Samaha, who had close ties with the Syrian regime, was arrested in August 2012 for plotting attacks in Lebanon along with two Syrian officials.
His trial started in June 2013 but had been repeatedly postponed for failing to summon Ali Mamlouk and a Syrian colonel identified only by his first name, Adnan, the cases of whom were included in Samaha’s case.
Last March, the tribunal decided to separate the trial of detainee Michel Samaha from that of Syrian security Chief General Ali Mamlouk.
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