Lebanon’s caretaker prime minister is in contact with security and judicial officials to follow up on reports that senior members of President Bashar al-Assad’s government have fled to Lebanon.
Najib Mikati’s office quoted him as saying on Tuesday that Lebanon abides by international laws regarding people who cross its borders.
Rami Abdurrahman of the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition war monitor, said that several top security officials have entered Lebanon over the past two days.
Abdurrahman added that Syria’s former intelligence chief Ali Mamlouk, who is wanted in Lebanon over two bombings in 2012 in the northern city of Tripoli that killed dozens, was allegedly brought to Lebanon by the Hezbollah group and was staying in a southern suburb of Beirut where the group has deep support.
Lebanon’s Interior Minister Bassam Mawlawi, whose ministry is in charge of border crossings, told reporters Tuesday that no person who is wanted in Lebanon entered the country through legal border crossings.
There are dozens of illegal border crossings between Lebanon and Syria where people are usually smuggled in and out of Lebanon, but it was not possible to independently confirm whether Mamlouk had entered the country.
