Lebanese judge issues terrorism arrest warrants

Beirut - Lebanese military court investigator Judge Rachid Mezher issued on Friday eight arrest warrants for suspects involved in an explosion that killed five people in the Lebanese city of Tripoli in September. The explosion on September 29 targeted a military bus carrying at least 20 soldiers, leaving at least five dead and 21 injured. The explosion was part of a chain of sporadic bombings, mainly targeting the army. Lebanon's Public Prosecutor Said Mirza last month accused 34 men including Syrians, Saudis, Lebanese and Palestinians of belonging to the Fatah al-Islam cell that is believed to behind the attacks on the army. Mirza said the men, eight of whom were at large, sympathised with Fatah al-Islam, which fought the Lebanese army for 15 weeks at the Nahr al-Bared refugee camp in northern Lebanon last year. At least 430 people were killed in the fighting, including 170 soldiers and 220 militants. Several Lebanese politicians at the time accused Syria of backing Fatah al-Islam. The arrest warrants came a day after Syria said members of Fatah al-Islam were behind a suicide car bomb attack that killed 17 people in Damascus in September. State television showed what it said were 12 members of Fatah al-Islam, an al-Qaeda-inspired group that first emerged in Palestinian refugee camps of Nahr al-Bared in northern Lebanon, confessing that they had helped plan the September 27 attack on an intelligence complex in the Syrian capital. Abdel Baqi Hussein, a Syrian who identified himself as the security coordinator of Fatah al-Islam, said the explosives had been smuggled from Lebanon and the suicide bomber was a Saudi. Syria's ties with Saudi Arabia and Iraq have been tense in recent years. Several Iraqi officials have accused Damascus of turning a blind eye to Islamist fighters crossing into Iraq. Saudi Arabia also has expressed its dismay with Syria's support for the Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah and the suspected role of Syrian officials in the 2005 assassination of Lebanese former premier Rafik Hariri. Damascus has denied involvement in the Hariri assassination.