REPORT: National Defense Parliamentary Committee convenes, tackles Abra incidents

The National Defense Parliamentary Committee convened on Thursday at the Parliament in al-Nejmeh Square and tackled the latest events witnessed in Abra, in the presence of caretaker Defense Minister Fayez Ghosn who stressed the need to support the military institution.             

Sources told LBCI that videos depicting Sheikh Ahmad Assir’s gunmen shooting at Lebanese Armed Forces members were displayed during the session.               

For his part, MP Khaled Daher accused MP Nawaf al-Moussawi of calling on the deputies to leave the session, stressing that March 8 MPs mainly Hezbollah’s MPs were attempting to undermine the importance of the meeting.

Fighting in Sidon city began Sunday (23 June) after troops arrested a follower of hardline Sunni cleric Sheikh Ahmad al-Assir follower.

The army says the cleric's supporters opened fire without provocation on an army checkpoint.

Official reports said at least 17 soldiers were killed and 50 were wounded in the fighting while more than 20 of al-Assir's supporters died in the battle, according to a security official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to talk to reporters.

Al-Assir is a virulent critic of the powerful Shiite group Hezbollah group, which along with its allies dominates Lebanon's government.

He supports rebels fighting to oust Syria's President Bashar Assad. The 2 day fighting between troops and armed supporters of al-Assir have transformed the city, which had been largely spared the violence plaguing border areas near Syria, into a combat zone.


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