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"The Story of My Arrest and Accusation" - by
Michel Kilo
This article originally appeared in Arabic on "Levant News"
Summary and Translation by Joe Pace
for "Syria Comment"
Dec. 16, 2006
The article begins with Michel Kilo, Syria's
most articulate opposition member, accusing the authorities of
“misleading public opinion with the delusion that there is a
terrifying conspiracy, with hidden threads, and that I am
plotting it and that I am its center.” Kilo was arrested in May
2006 after signing the "Beirut-Damascus Declaration" and having
led the Syrian opposition's attempts for unify its ranks.
His interrogators grilled him about the
Beirut-Damascus Declaration. He says that they were polite and
courteous at the branch and said that “my presence in the
[security branch] did not detract from my value as a political,
national thinker and as an intellectual known for
integrity.” True to his nationalist credentials, he says that
his intentions were to better relations between Syria and
Lebanon to prevent Israel and America from exploiting the rift.
“I told the interrogators in the security [branch] that an
essential element of the declaration which cannot be overlooked
focuses on the praising of Syrian-Lebanese cooperation which led
to the end of the Israeli occupation of the south, and the
signatories demand that neither country become a pathway or
headquarters against the other, and their insistence on unified
efforts to liberate the Golan and all remaining occupied
Lebanese land, and solidify the Syrian-Lebanese
relationship…which would ensure their unity and make them immune
from foreign penetration, destruction, or weakening.”
Kilo recounts some of the back-and-forth in the
interrogation. They said that the Zionists and America
supported the position outlined in Declaration since the March
14 contingent supported it. Kilo responds: Washington and Tel
Aviv want to drive a rift between Syria and Lebanon whereas the
Declaration calls for the opposite. They accused Kilo of siding
with outside powers, noting the similarities between Resolution
1680 and the Declaration. Kilo replies that any similarities
are coincidental and that his purpose is anathema to the West’s
since the West fears the very unity for which Kilo calls.
He mentions that Professor Marwan al-Luji, the
public prosecutor in Damascus forced four of the signers to sign
a statement saying: “Michel Kilo agreed with Khaddam regarding
the declaration in exchange for his immediate release.” On June
11, 2006, an article appeared in Ath-Thawra claiming that the
investigation proved that he had met with Marwan Hamaada in
Cyprus and took money to sign the Declaration. Kilo sent a
letter to the newspaper contesting the story, but the newspaper
refused to publish it. He tried to raise a suit, but the public
prosecutor refused.
The court ordered Michel’s release but the
public prosecutor fabricated another case to keep him in prison
and has prevented his defense team from contesting it. Despite
being publicly accused of opening up channels of communications
with Khaddam, the prosecutor has yet to issue that charge, or
any other justifying his continued detention. Writes Kilo: “I
told the judge of the second criminal court that I was being
detained on one charge and being tried for another, an
undeclared charge. I demanded that they charge me with
contacting Khaddam or whomever…” in order to contest it. He
reaffirms that the Declaration was for and by intellectuals and
that it is neither allied with nor beholden to any party or
political trend. “It is not a declaration of incitement, but
one of reconciliation whose sole purpose is to secure the
Syrian-Lebanon relationship on proper grounds and repair a basis
for Arab relations anew.”
He points out the irony that they would accuse
him of cooperating with Khaddam when he had written articles
lambasting him when he was still Vice President and was in turn
threatened with imprisonment. He recalls that he spoke out
against Khaddam’s group at a Temporary Committee for the
Damascus Declaration meeting and called him a “threat to the
opposition because he moves the center of work and decision
making outside of Syria.”
He says that the Beirut-Damascus Declaration is
not the reason for his arrest. He says that the authorities are
aware that he did not contact any hostile elements, that they
have the recordings of the Committee meetings sessions
evidencing his mistrust of Khaddam, and that he has never called
for the initiation of hostilities against Syria. The reason is
that “there are those who want to take revenge on me because
I am a symbol of the opposition, rational and socially accepted,
and because I focused my efforts on succeeding in building a
vision based on shared ground.”
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