LEBANON: AMAL MILITIA DISCOVERS HIZBOLLAH PRISON WHERE COLONEL WILLIAM HIGGINS WAS BELIEVED TO HAVE BEEN HELD

Record ID: 432715

  • Title: LEBANON: AMAL MILITIA DISCOVERS HIZBOLLAH PRISON WHERE COLONEL WILLIAM HIGGINS WAS BELIEVED TO HAVE BEEN HELD
  • Date: 20th January 1990
  • Summary: KAWTHARIYET AS-SIYAD, LEBANON (JANUARY 18, 1990) 1. GV EXTERIOR OF BUILDING HOUSING PRISON 0.05 2. SV AND SCU DISCOVERED WEAPONS ON DISPLAY (2 SHOTS) 0.11 3. SV PEOPLE ENTERING BUILDING 0.18 4. SVS MAN OPENING CONCEALED DOOR AND SHOWING THICKNESS OF DOOR (2 SHOTS) 0.28 5. SV PAN AND SV INTERIOR OF CELL AND BROKEN CHAIR WITHIN CELL (2 SHOTS) 0.38 6. SV PHOTOGRAPHER EMERGING FROM CELL 0.41 7. SVS MORE DISCOVERED ARMS CACHE AND FALSE CAR NUMBER PLATES (4 SHOTS) 1.01 8. GV EXTERIOR BUILDING 1.05 Initials Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved
  • Embargoed: 4th February 1990 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: KAWTHARIYET AS-SIYAD, LEBANON
  • Country: Lebanon
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVA3F9MXOYA51YO6HW8S2RTJAS3R
  • Story Text: KAWTHARIYET AS-SIYAD, LEBANON

    Lieutenant Colonel William Higgins, an American hostage murdered by Lebanese kidnappers, was once held in a bloodstained secret prison controlled by the Hizbollah, according to the Amal militia, the group's local rivals.

    The prison, with a concealed entrance, soundproof cork-lined door and five underground cells, was shown to reporters on Thursday (18/1) by Amal, a Syrian-backed militia drawn from Lebanon's divided Shi'ite Moslem community.

    According to Amal's security chief for south Lebanon, Melhem Kanso, the prison was found a week ago beneath a car paint shop in an unfinished building in the village of Kawthariyet as-Siyad, 50 km (30 miles) south of Beirut.

    Kanso said that Hizbollah, the pro-Iranian fundamentalist militia, has used the place as a prison, torture chamber and base for sabotage attacks over the past three years.

    Higgins, a United Nations truce observer, was kidnapped on February 17, 1988.

    The "Organisation of the Oppressed of the World" said on July 31 last year that it had killed Higgins in reprisal for Israel's abduction of Hizbollah cleric Sheikh Abdel-Karim Obeld.

    Following the release of a video-recording showing Higgins hanging from a rope, U.S. and United Nations officials concluded that Higgins was indeed dead. However suspicion remained that Higgins might have died under torture months before and that the hanging had been staged for the videocamera using Higgin's corpse.

    Kanso said that Amal discovered that Higgins was detained in the prison for three days after questioning members of Hizbollah and examining papers and documents left there.

    <strong>Source: REUTERS - HASSAN HANKIR</strong>
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
  • Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2016. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
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