France court orders release of Lebanese militant after 40 years in jail

A French appeals court Thursday ordered the release of pro-Palestinian Lebanese militant Georges Ibrahim Abdallah, imprisoned for 40 years for the 1982 killings of two foreign diplomats.

Abdallah, 74, is one of the longest-serving prisoners in France, where most convicts on life sentences are freed after less than 30 years.

He has been up for release for 25 years, but the United States, a civil party to the case, has consistently opposed his release.

Abdallah was detained in 1984 and sentenced to life in prison in 1987 for his involvement in the murders of U.S. military attache Charles Robert Ray and Israeli diplomat Yacov Barsimantov in Paris.

Lebanese of Maronite Christian heritage, he has always insisted he is not a "criminal" but a "fighter" for the rights of Palestinians, whom he said were targeted, along with Lebanon, by the United States and Israel.

The Paris Appeals Court ordered that he be freed from a prison in the south of France on July 25, on condition that he leave French territory and never return.

It stated that the length of his detention had been "disproportionate" and that he no longer posed a danger to the public.

On Thursday, Abdallah told left-wing deputy Andree Taurinya, who visited him in prison, that his liberation was the result of efforts by his supporters.

"The fact that they agreed to free me is thanks to this growing mobilisation," he told the MP, in the presence of an AFP reporter.

Several sources reported that he was to be flown to Paris and then to Beirut.

Prosecutors can file an appeal with France's highest court, but any such request is not expected to be processed fast enough to halt his release next week.

'Delighted'

The detainee's brother, Robert Abdallah, in Lebanon, told AFP he was overjoyed.

"We're delighted. I didn't expect the French judiciary to make such a decision, nor for him to ever be freed, especially after so many failed requests for release," he said.

"For once, the French authorities have freed themselves from Israeli and U.S. pressure," he added.

Lebanese authorities have repeatedly stated that Abdallah should be released from jail and have written to the appeals court to say they would organize his return home.

Abdallah's lawyer, Jean-Louis Chalanset, also welcomed the decision, calling it a "political scandal " that Abdallah was not released earlier.

Israel's embassy in Paris, meanwhile, released a statement saying it regretted the decision to release Abdallah.

"Such terrorists, enemies of the free world, should spend their lives in prison," it said.

Lebanon's charge d'affaires in Paris, Ziad Taan, told AFP that the country was "extremely satisfied" with the decision, adding that Abdallah would be "welcome" in Lebanon.

In November last year, a French court ordered Abdallah to be released on condition that he leave France.

But France's anti-terror prosecutors, arguing that he had not changed his political views, appealed the decision, which was suspended.

A verdict was supposed to have been delivered in February, but the Paris appeals court postponed it over compensation payments.

'Past symbol'

The court re-examined the latest request for his release last month.

During the closed-door hearing, Abdallah's lawyer informed the judges that 16,000 euros had been deposited into the prisoner's bank account, at the disposal of civil parties in the case, including the United States, according to several sources who attended.

Abdallah was wounded as a teenager when Israel invaded Lebanon in 1978 in the early years of the country's civil war.

As an adult, he founded the Lebanese Armed Revolutionary Factions (LARF), a Marxist pro-Syria and anti-Israel group that has now been dissolved.

After his arrest in 1984, French police discovered submachine guns and transceiver stations in one of his Paris apartments.

The appeals court in February, however, noted that the FARL "had not committed a violent action since 1984" and that Abdallah "today represented a past symbol of the Palestinian struggle."

Lebanon hosts tens of thousands of Palestinians, according to the United Nations, most descendants of those who fled or were expelled from their land during the creation of Israel in 1948.