TRIPOLI, Lebanon: Armed men opened fire yesterday in the north Lebanese city of Tripoli on the convoy of a pro-Damascus minister, wounding some of his bodyguards, a security official told AFP.
Four of Youth and Sports Minister Faisal Karameh’s bodyguards were hit, said the official, who added that the gunmen were on their way to a sit-in organized by Lebanese elements bitterly opposed to the regime of President Bashar Assad in neighboring Syria.
A fifth man, a passerby, was also wounded. The shooting came “while the minister was on his way in his convoy to join Friday prayers in a mosque in the city,” added the official. An AFP correspondent said one of the minister’s vehicles went up in flames after the attack.
“I don’t think I was personally targeted,” Karameh told a Lebanese television channel shortly afterwards, adding that his attackers “did not know I would be passing.”
But he said the attack “threatens Tripoli’s stability and security.”
Fierce clashes raged yesterday in the majority Kurdish northern Syrian city of Ras Al-Ain on the Turkish border, a day after a sniper killed a French journalist in embattled Aleppo.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights confirmed Yves Debay’s death yesterday, after Aleppo-based activists accused regime troops of the shooting, and distributed photographs of his body and press card.
At least 17 professional journalists, both foreign and Syrian, and 44 citizen journalists have died reporting on one of the deadliest wars for the media in recent years, according to figures from watchdog Reporters Without Borders.
The fighting in Ras Al-Ain came six months after troops loyal Assad withdrew from majority Kurdish areas, leaving residents to fend for themselves. Jihadists have since staged several assaults on the strategic city, and most of its residents have fled.
Syria’s Kurds are divided over the revolt against Assad — some support the regime, others back the revolt and yet others are striving to stay neutral.
Yesterday, fighters from radical groups Al-Nusra Front and Ghuraba Al-Sham battled Kurdish militiamen a day after launching a new assault on the border town, residents and activists said.
On Thursday, “the fighting became more intense in the evening after Kurdish fighters received reinforcements to try to stop the fiercest rebel assault ever since insurgents first arrived in the city” in November, a resident identifying himself only as Mohammed said.
Pro-Assad Lebanon minister targeted
