The following are summaries of today's major stories published in the
Arabic press. LBCI does not edit press digest articles for content, giving
English-language readers insight into the various views expressed in newspapers
across the Arab world.
An-Nahar Paris correspondent said that the French President Francois
Hollande is expected to meet on the 28th of January with MP Walid Jumblatt and
added that on the 30th of January he will be meeting with the Kataeb Party
Leader Amine Gemayel.
According to
An-Nahar, Hollande will be discussing with the Lebanese
officials regional developments as well as the Lebanese situation in light of
the Syrian crisis.
Sources
said to
An-Nahar newspaper said that a deal is underway to bring the file of the
9 Lebanese detainees in Syria's Aazaz to a close with an exchange deal for releasing more than 1000
Syrian detainees in exchange.
Sources
pointed out that the Syrian government is considering the demand of ending this
file after the detainees became a burden on the kidnappers given that a number
of kidnappers were either wounded during the battle of the military Meng
Airport near Aleppo
or left Aazaz for Turkey.
The same sources added
that the detainees were transferred a few days ago from Aazaz to the town of Darat Izza in Reef Aleppo for fear of falling in the hands of
other assailants; moving the file backward to its early stages after negotiations
reached an advanced point.
The spokesman of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon Martin Youssef said that the
direct threat and the danger to which the life of the witnesses are exposed
to form the most dangerous menace faced by the international justice, noting that
“the threat does not only affect those exposed to the media, but all 557
witnesses.”
Youssef told
Al-Mustaqbal daily that the tribunal kicked off its investigations
to reveal the sources of the leaks, stressing that they will prosecute all
those involved in leaking secret information once they are proved guilty.
In this context, the STL spokesman noted that the tribunal will launch its
work on the 25 March 2013, pointing out that there are no compelling reasons that
require further delay.
Future bloc MP Ahmad Fatfat revealed that the session of the parliamentary
sub-committee which was held on Monday afternoon, turned into a deep political
dialogue, noting that the deputies representing the parliamentary blocs
discussed many issues, mainly the concerns of each party and confession.
In a statement to
Al-Liwaa Daily, Fatfat stressed that the sub-committee’s
morning session was better than what was portrayed via the media, following the
statement of the Free Patriotic Movement’s representative Alain Aoun who
“mourned the death of the hybrid electoral law.”
In this context, Fatfat said
that this comment was not accurate, since the discussions are still ongoing
concerning this proposal, but they have not yet reached common consensus.
“After each one of us acknowledged the limits of the other, it became possible
to propose solutions during today’s session,” he said, pointing out that the
committee does not make the political decision.
- Army Intelligence arrests “most expensive agent”
As-Safir Daily
reported that the Lebanese Army Intelligence made an achievement within
the framework of following up on the case of the Israeli spy networks,
and has arrested an agent who has worked for the Israeli Mossad for 23
years.
In this context, security sources told the newspaper that
the agent, identified as R. A. Y. from Baalbek, was a member of the
city’s municipal council and an employee at the Ministry of Public
works. The sources added that he admitted to dealing with Israel and
has visited the occupied Palestinian territories and Tel Aviv, as well
as other countries where he met with his recruiters and attended sessions
with the Mossad which included sessions on how to use of invisible ink.
The
security sources added that the aforementioned agent had an effective
role during the Israeli war against Lebanon in July 2006, and confessed
that he provided the enemy with information about the
resistance and the Lebanese Army and names of officials and leaders of
Hezbollah and the Amal Movement.
It was also revealed that this
agent is considered the “most expensive agent” among all those who were
arrested so far, since Israel paid him around 600 thousand dollars for
his services.