Rifi Lays Blame on Political and Judicial Authorities for Roumieh Trial Delays

Justice Minister Ashraf Rifi said politicians and judicial authorities were to blame for the procrastination to take into trial Islamist inmates at Roumieh prison.

Rifi told al-Liwaa daily published on Monday that he came up with a plan to speed up their trials.

“It is our duty to fix the flaws,” he said about the “political and judicial authorities' delay” to try the inmates.

“A five-year postponement is unacceptable,” he said.

The Islamists were arrested during the gunbattles between Fatah al-Islam militants and the Lebanese army in the northern Palestinian refugee camp of Nahr al-Bared in 2007. The inmates were indicted in 2012.

Rifi also blamed the inmates, saying they were obstructing justice for refusing to go to court.

Police should force them to do so, he said.

Roumieh, the oldest and largest of Lebanon's overcrowded prisons, has witnessed sporadic prison breaks and escalating riots in recent years as inmates living in poor conditions demand better treatment.

Rifi told al-Liwaa that he agreed with Interior Minister Nouhad al-Mashnouq during the last cabinet session on resolving the problem of Lebanon's prisons.

There are now more than 6,000 inmates in the prisons, which only have a capacity of 4,000, he said.

The solution lies in building more prisons in the North, South and the eastern Bekaa Valley. But financial problems are hindering the plan, the minister added.