DAMASCUS: A military court in Damascus has sentenced former Syrian Vice President Abdel Halim Khaddam to hard labor for life, a lawyer involved in the case told AFP yesterday.
“Judge Mohammed Kaddour Assad of the Damascus First Military Criminal Court has handed Abdel Halim Khaddam 13 sentences, including hard labor for life,” lawyer Hossam Eddine Al-Habash said.
The court has ordered that Khaddam, in his 70s, be stripped of his civil rights and prevented from residing in Damascus or Tartus, his native town, Habash said.
Khaddam, who resigned as Syria’s vice president in 2005 to join the opposition and now lives in Paris, is accused of “slandering the Syrian leadership and lying before an international tribunal regarding the killing of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri,” according to the charge sheet obtained by AFP.
He is also accused of “conspiracy to unlawfully seize political power” and of having “illegitimate links with the Zionist enemy, undermining the prestige of the state.”
