Amnesty International calls for releasing Lebanese detainees

The official in charge of the Amnesty International Organization in Canada, Ronald Adams, has held Israel fully responsible for the fate of more than 200 Lebanese prisoners in Israeli jails, including Khiam jail.

In a message he sent to Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and circulated by the follow-up committee in backing the question of the Lebanese detainees in Israeli jails circulated in Beirut on Tuesday, Adams said, "As Israel is the occupation force for south Lebanon, then it fully shoulders the responsibility of the detained Lebanese citizens and its has to immediately release them."

He warned against taking those prisoners to Israel for trial, saying that this will be considered a violation of human rights.

Meanwhile, the British human rights activist Linda Keen in a similar message to Ehud Barak while he was in Shepherdstown, denounced the seizure of more than 200 Lebanese citizens by the Israeli occupation forces.

In her message Keen added, "Israel has been seizing the Lebanese as hostages for several years, torturing them and using them as papers for bargaining."