Lebanon's Leading Paper Charged

By: Sam F. Ghattas, Associated Press Writer (AP) Prosecutors have charged Lebanon's leading newspaper and an opposition politician with defaming the army for a report on alleged mistreatment of recruits during training, the daily said Friday.

It is the military's second lawsuit against the press in a week and follows a widely condemned crackdown on the opposition.

The charges stem from an article on compulsory military service written by opposition politician Rafi Madayan and published by the An-Nahar newspaper on Aug. 9. Madayan and the newspaper's editor, Joseph Nasr, have been charged with "slandering the army and harming its reputation," an official in the prosecutor's office said.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the army referred the case to the military prosecutor, who decided to turn it over to the civilian courts.

Both Nasr and Madayan said they had not yet been notified of the charges. "They are annoyed about An-Nahar's role in defending freedoms and from my recent critical political stand," Madayan said.

In the article, Madayan criticized the rough training and mistreatment that some young men receive during their national service. "I consider the issue of compulsory service an infringement on the freedom of the young men and the freedom to make their own choices, such as rejecting war and the use of weapons as a violent means," Madayan wrote.

The article appeared during a sweep in which the military detained up to 250 Christian activists opposed to the government and the presence of 25,000 Syrian troops in Lebanon.

Critics of the clampdown said it was a prelude to militarization of the administration.

On Aug. 24, the army filed a defamation suit against Al-Watan Al-Arabi, a Lebanese magazine based in Paris, for an article alleging that Syrian officers were in command of some Lebanese army units and that 5,000 Syrian soldiers were serving in Lebanese army uniforms.

Syria has the ultimate say in major decisions in Lebanon. But Lebanese Christians and other community leaders have increasingly called for Syria to withdraw its troops since Israel ended its occupation of southern Lebanon in May 2000.