Hariri: Late Syrian security chief tried to speak out
A statement by Lebanon's former Prime Minister Saad Hariri that Rustom Ghazaleh asked to go on television before his death suggests the former Syrian intelligence chief was about to break with the Syrian government.
WASHINGTON — A former Syrian intelligence chief in Lebanon, Rustom Ghazaleh, asked to go on an anti-Syrian regime TV station just before what turned out to be a fatal beating in Syria, former Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri said April 27.
Responding to a question from Al-Monitor during a meeting with journalists and Middle East experts at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Hariri said that Ghazaleh — whose death was reported by Lebanese media April 24 — had “contacted somebody I know” in February and expressed his desire to make a public statement on Hariri’s Future TV station.
Hariri said he did not know exactly what Ghazaleh intended to say, but suggested that he was about to break with the Assad regime and that that was the reason behind what turned out to be a fatal beating.
“Straight after that, we heard he got beaten up,” Hariri said.
