Daily Star - Najjar apologizes to Egypt over Ketermaya lynching, May 5, 2010

By Agence France Presse (AFP) and The Daily Star

BEIRUT: Justice Minister Ibrahim Najjar extended Tuesday his apologies to the Egyptian people and government for the lynching of a wanted Egyptian national last week.
Najjar made his remarks to reporters after receiving the Egyptian foreign minister’s aide for consulate and expatriates affairs Mohammad Abdel- Hakam along with the Egyptian Ambassador to Lebanon Ahmad Fouad al-Bediwi.
“The meeting represented a chance for me to apologize to the Egyptian people and government for the reaction in the village of Ketermaya,” said Najjar, adding that the crime wouldn’t have occurred had the gruesome act that instigated “this collective reaction” not happened.
Egyptian Mohammad Salim al-Msallem, 38, was the prime suspect in the deadly stabbing on Wednesday of an elderly couple and their two granddaughters, aged 7 and 9, in the village of Ketermaya, just southeast of Beirut.
Msallem was being driven by police to re-enact his crime on Thursday when several hundred residents, who had gathered in the village square for the funeral procession, stopped the police car. They dragged Msallem out, beat and stabbed him to death and hung his body on a pole with a butcher’s hook as police watched helplessly.
Reports said that Msallem had already been suspected in Ketermaya of the rape of a 13-year-old girl two months earlier.
Asked whether his apology was made on behalf of the Lebanese government, Najjar noted that the Cabinet didn’t task him with expressing his regrets.
He added that “every Lebanese shares with me this apology that shouldn’t be separated from the prior action,” in a reference to Msallim’s killing of the four victims.
Najjar dismissed reports that a police officer had been arrested for negligence.
When asked whether the individuals who participated in the lynching would be punished, Najjar said that “this issue has to do with the independence of judiciary.”
Asked whether security forces have arrested anyone involved in the lynching following the Ketermaya mayor’s refusal to hand over any suspects from the village, Najjar said that probes were being conducted “based on the requirements of justice and away from the media to avoid causing additional actions and reactions.”
The minister added that pictures of the mob killing have revealed the identities of 10 of the individuals involved.
“It is very difficult to determine all the perpetrators when the reaction takes place collectively,” said Najjar.
For his part, Abdel-Hakam voiced his “trust in the Lebanese justice minister and judiciary, as well as the application of the Lebanese law in this issue.”
Abdel-Hakam extended his condolences to the families of the four victims in Ketermaya’s “gruesome crime that Egypt strongly condemned.”
He also voiced hope that the Lebanese judiciary would apply the Lebanese law on suspects participating in the lynching.
Abdel-Hakam rejected reports that exceptional security measures were being taken to protect the Egyptian Embassy in Lebanon. “This information is unfounded and the incident will not affect the strong and special Lebanese-Egyptian relations,” he said.
“It is important to respect the law and judiciary, and not to be driven to emotional reactions that don’t lead to any result, and it is of great significance to wait for the verdict of the Lebanese judiciary and to pursue the suspects,” said Abdel-Hakam when asked about the anger of the Egyptian public following the events in Ketermaya. – AFP, with The Daily Star


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