LOC17:30
14:30 GMT
PARIS, Oct 4 (KUNA) -- French authorities said here Monday that convicted
Lebanese terrorist Georges Ibrahim Abdallah has not renounced terrorist action
and this is part of the explanation why he has not been granted parole.
Already last year, the French parole board rejected Abdallahs appeal for
release after 26 years in detention. He was captured in France in 1984 and
sentenced to life in prison in 1987 for the 1982 murder of the US military
attach{ in Paris, Lieutenant Colonel Charles Ray.
French Foreign Ministry spokesman Bernard Valero pointed out that Abdallah
was in jail "for assassination" and his demand for parole was rejected in May
2009.
A French Appeals Court has now followed the advisory from the parole board
"believing that the legal criteria have not been fulfilled."
Valero also noted that parole is not a right and decisions on commuting or
reducing sentences belong to courts and not to the Justice Ministry or
political powers that be.
Abdallah, a former member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of
Palestine (PFLP), broke away from that group and formed the Lebanese Armed
Revolutionary Faction (LARF), which organized operations from France until the
police arrested Abdallah.
The Lebanese terrorist has still continued to issue statements from his
jail cell, expressing support for other convicted terrorists from other
groups, especially a number of extreme leftists currently in jail in France or
who have been recently released on parole. (end)
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KUNA 041730 Oct 10NNNN