Kuwait summons 1,500 people in probe of Mughniyeh ceremony

 

Kuwait has summoned more than 1,500 suspects, including Kuwaiti citizens as well as others from various Arab and Islamic nationalities, over a rally to mourn senior Hizbullah commander Imad Mughniyeh. Diplomatic sources in Kuwait said interrogation was under way with some of them.

 

The summonses relate to an investigation into a rally to mourn Mughniyeh, who was killed by a car bomb in Damascus on February 12.

 

The suspects were summoned for “suspicion of belonging to Hizbullah and for intimidating state security,” said one source.

 

The sources said prominent Shiite Kuwaiti MPs Ahmad Lari and Adnan Abdel-Samad will not be debriefed because they enjoy parliamentary immunity.

 

Prior to the summons, interrogation was carried out with three other Kuwaiti officials.

 

“Mughniyeh is a martyr hero who shook the grounds beneath the Zionist enemy [Israel] and America … His blood will wipe Israel off the map,” Abdel-Samad told a large crowd that took part in Mughniyeh”s mourning.

But Abdel-Samad denied that Mughniyeh, who was on America”s most wanted list for a series of attacks on Israeli and Western targets in Lebanon in the 1980s, was involved in two plane hijackings and a series of bombings in Kuwait.

 

“There is no evidence whatsoever to prove that Mughniyeh was either the mastermind or a perpetrator in the hijackings or the bombings,” he said.

 

Although it is widely believed that Mughniyeh was behind the hijackings in Kuwait, the Gulf state has never officially accused him.

 

A former Egyptian steward with Kuwait Airways has said he recognized Mughniyeh as the hijacker of two Kuwaiti passenger planes in the 1980s.

The planes were seized by militant Shiite groups to demand the release of 17 Shiite activists jailed in Kuwait for carrying out a series of bombings against US, French and Kuwaiti targets.

 

About one-third of Kuwait”s native population of one million are Shiites. However, they have only four MPs in the 50-member Parliament.

 

On Tuesday, the head of Israeli military intelligence, Major General Amos Yadlin, warned of an imminent retaliatory attack against Israel by Hizbullah to avenge the killing of Mughniyeh.

 

“From past experience we know that many retaliatory terror attacks often come on the 40th day following such an assassination,” Yadlin said.

 

Israeli intelligence sources on Wednesday said Hizbullah was cooperating with Palestinian factions in order to conduct military operations aimed at avenging the assassination.

 

The Israeli news Web site Debka quoted sources as saying Hizbullah has trained members of several Palestinian groups to keep the Israeli Army busy with confrontation in Gaza so that Hizbullah will have time to direct an attack on northern Israel.

 

In other developments, Syrian sources said several Arab nations conspired with Israel”s Mossad psy agency to assassinate Mughniyeh, the London-based Al-Quds Al-Arabi daily reported on Wednesday.

 

According to the report, which could not be confirmed by any official source, Syria was making significant progress in the investigation of Mughniyeh”s death, and would publish the results of its inquiry following the Arab League summit in Damascus in March.