THE
CANADIAN LEBANESE
HUMAN RIGHTS FEDERATION (CLHRF)
E.Mail clhrf@ yahoo.com
Phone & Fax # (905-2729389)
Web site
Day after day, it is becoming very certain that the Syrian army deployed in Lebanon, is controlling the Lebanese state, its institutions, and its affairs which have diverged from the democratic norms, by being chained to the Syrian Intelligence services under local masks.
The ferocious security campaign launched recently (since August 5th) against the rank and file of the independent nationalist currents, who oppose the Syrian hegemony, has been characterized by suppression, violence, false accusations, and violations of the constitution and laws. The crackdown represents an ultimate challenge to the legal echelons of power, to human rights covenants, and to those in charge of enforcing them.
These unjust and obscene campaigns lead us
to conclude that the goals may include:
1-To deliver a severe strike against the independence currents, through
physical beatings, arbitrary arrests, and fabricated false charges against the rank and
file of the Free patriotic Current, and the Lebanese Forces, and the Liberal national
Party who are being used as scapegoats.
2-To terrorize those Lebanese who persistently seek the return of their freedom, sovereignty, and independence from those who violated them. And the attempt to domesticate the people by pushing them into seeking protection from exclusive agents of the Syrian influence in Lebanon.
3-To accelerate the bleeding emigration of proud Lebanese by persecuting them, and suppressing their freedoms, as well as the implantations of illegal residents among them, and the tilting the balance towards the Syrian hegemony through voices of the newly nationalized, whose long delayed case is being challenged in the country’s supreme court.
4-To attack the national entente pursued by large segments of the sovereign Lebanese, and to forbid them from meeting and forming alliances/bonds. This ferocious attack against the active intelligentsia came as a response by the regime, to his beatitude Maronite Cardinal Sfeir’s visit to the mountain districts (Shouf, Jezine, and Mount Lebanon) intended to consecrate the return of the Lebanese refugees, and to strengthen the entente with the Druze community and its leader, Mr. Walid Joumblat.
5-To persist in marginalizing Lebanon. The show of force through the Syrian stick has ravaged Lebanon’s democratic parliamentary system, and has humiliated both the Executive and Legislative branches of government. It has also shown the incapacity of the Lebanese government for make decisions, and forced the parliament to repudiate the same judicial law it passed only tow weeks earlier, in violation of the Constitution which specifically disallows voting on the same law twice during the same house session. This is not the first time that the institutions are thrown into confusion, and its representatives forced to negate their stands and convictions.
6-To suffocate the freedom of opinion, expression, assembly, and press. And to prohibit the formation of associations and civil organizations except when they are supporters of the regime.
7-To attempt the criminalization of the majority of Christians by launching arbitrary accusations inferring their bet on Israel.
Observers are questioning the qualification of such government to host the Francophone summit under conditions of adulterous tyranny where freedoms are slaughtered and jails are filled with free consciences. Politician and intellectuals from all walks of life, as well as religious and human rights organizations, have all deplored the scandalous human recent rights violations, beatings and arrests of peaceful protesters in front of the “Palace of Justice”. These violations were witnessed by members of the Lawyers Association (Bar Association), and in full view of Lebanese gendarmes (Internal Security forces), as well as photographers and journalists who documented the arrests and beatings with sound, picture, and words.
In protest, the Lebanese Lawyers Syndicates along with the Syndicates of Independent Professions executed strikes for several days because many of the arrested were attorneys, engineers, doctors, as well as university students. The positions taken by the lawyers syndicates represents the Lebanese people condemnation of against these violations of their rights, and a rejection of the poor excuses used by the regime to justify the referral of the arrestees to the military courts. The arrests are considered a violation of the Lebanese Constitution, which clearly sanctions Human Rights. The regime’s actions are not based on any legal framework, and the investigations are being conducted under duress and outside all legal norms, and by consequence, all results are Null and Void.
The Canadian Lebanese Human Rights Federation requests the Canadian government’s support for the Lebanese people in their struggle for liberation, which has long lasted. The union is grateful for the Canadian government’s participation in the peace efforts and the UN peacekeeping operations. Canada has taken upon itself to spread peace and the values of freedom, justice, forgiveness/coexistence, democracy, and the upholding of human rights. The Lebanese people who are breaded on freedom, love, and hospitality share with the Canadian people these values. Would Canada add its voice in support in of the tortured People of Lebanon, and demand the immediate release of all those arrested because of their opinions and their attachment to the freedom, sovereignty, and independence of Lebanon, which Syria portrays as an aggression against it?
It is time for the international community to forbid the devouring of Lebanon by the Syrian military force controlling it. The world should avoid the dissolution the Lebanon free and democratic system, and the targeted persecution of the Christian society whose existence, civilization, and identity is being threatened. Because by marginalizing the Christian presence in Lebanon through oppression, persecution, impoverishment, and forced emigration, Lebanon will fall into the ranks of other Middle Eastern dictatorial, military, and fundamentalist regimes.
Our Federation requests that the Canadian government support the struggle of the Lebanese people through the withdrawal of all foreign forces from the country and the restoration of Lebanon’s independence and its confiscated decision. We also seek Canada’ support for the implementation of UN resolution 520 which requires the withdrawal of all foreign armies from Lebanon, and the guarantee of its frontiers independence, and sovereignty. We are certain that the Canadian government is capable through its extensive efforts and leading/reputable position among the world’s capable nations to stop the bleeding in Lebanon, and the re-infusion of democratic life in its institutions (veins), and promoting initiative of goodwill to bring about the global and just peace in the middle east and end the bitter conflict which wastes life and inhibits stability and progress.
Yours truly
CLHRF Vice President
Hamid Aouad
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