A street leading to Adlieh detention center, near the Justice Palace, on August 7, 2022. (Anwar AMRO/AFP)
BEIRUT — Four of the more than 30 inmates who escaped from Adlieh detention center on Sunday have been arrested, the Internal Security Forces announced on Twitter Monday, without providing more details about the captured detainees.
Here’s what we know:
• “Through investigations and monitoring, four fugitives who escaped from the detention center under the bridge near Beirut's Justice Palace were arrested,” the ISF said in the tweet.
• More than 30 detainees escaped early Sunday from the Adlieh detention center in Beirut via a window after clandestinely bringing a tool into the facility, security and judicial sources reported.
• According to a judicial source who spoke on Sunday to AFP, “some detainees are Lebanese and others [are] foreigners, notably Syrians and Palestinians.”
• At this stage of the investigation, we are certain that there was no collusion on the part of agents of the Internal Security Forces,” a security source told L’Orient-Le Jour.
• Reacting to the prison break, MP Michel Moussa (Zahrani/Amal), who is the chairman of the Parliamentary Committee for Human Rights, described Sunday’s incident as “unacceptable” and said it “raises many questions. How does such a large number of prisoners manage to escape from a place that is supposed to be guarded and while it is protected by metal walls?”
• Formerly run by the General Security, Adlieh detention center is now under the control of the Lebanese Prison Authority. Human rights defenders have regularly denounced abuses against Syrian refugees and migrant domestic workers detained in the facility.