The United States have objected to France’s release of a Lebanese terrorist, saying he may still be a threat a quarter century after he was convicted of killing an American and an Israeli diplomat on French soil.
A former head of the Lebanese Armed Revolutionary Brigade, George Ibrahim Abdallah, who is now 61, was sentenced to life imprisonment in 1987 for his role in the 1982 murders in Paris of American military attaché Charles Ray and Israeli diplomat Yacov Barsimantov, and the attempted murder of US Consul General Robert Homme in Strasbourg in 1984.
Barsimantov 42, second secretary in charge of political affairs at the Israel Embassy in Paris, was fatally shot outside his Parisian home.
A French appeals court on Thursday granted conditional release to George Ibrahim Abdallah, imprisoned since 1984, contingent on his being deported to Lebanon, a step in the hands of the French Foreign Ministry.
But the US Ambassador to France Charles Rivkin criticized the decision to grant him parole, arguing that Abdallah had never expressed remorse and could yet be a threat if released.
"We don't think he should be released and we are continuing our consultations with the French government about it," said State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland at the daily briefing in Washington. "We have serious concerns that he could return to the battlefield."
Abdallah's lawyer, Jacques Verges, welcomed the ruling and said he hoped the government would not give in to U.S. pressure by refusing to expel him.
"I hope that we have an independent enough government to expel him," he said.