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Beirut (dpa) - The arrest of Michel Kilo, a prominent Syrian writer and a human rights activist, by Syrian security agents provoked Monday widescale condemnation among Lebanese journalists and activists.
Lebanese journalists and intellectuals strongly condemned the arrest of Kilo and said "this shows that those who think we can rebuild ties with such a Syrian regime are mistaken."
"There are two different regimes in Lebanon and Syria and they cannot meet," Pierre Attalah, a deputy and leftist activist said.
"We believe in a regime which is based on democracy and freedom ... this is why (anti-Syrian) journalist Samir Kassir was killed, because he believed in the unity of democracy between Lebanon and Syria," said Attalah, who signed the petition to condemn Kilo's arrest along with 21 other journalists and activists.
Kassir, an anti-Syrian journalist, was killed in a car bomb explosion in June last year. Lebanon was the target of a series of explosions in 2005 which mainly hit anti-Syrian political figures and journalists.
Also in 2005, former five-time premier Rafik Hariri was assassinated in a massive car bomb explosion. His assassination was widely blamed on Syria and its allies in Lebanon.
Syria, Lebanon's once powerbroker, under local and international pressure withdrew its troops from Lebanon in April 2005, following 29 years of military presence and political hegemony.
The National Organization for Human Rights in Syria said in a statement earlier that Michel Kilo was summoned by security agents on Sunday at noon and had not returned since then.
It added that Kilo, a member of the Committees for Reviving the Civil Society in Syria and a member of the Damascus Declaration, the broadest Syrian opposition gathering, was likely arrested for signing a statement by Syrian-Lebanese intellectuals.
That statement, issued last week and signed by more than 500 intellectuals from both countries, called for the improvement of Lebanese-Syrian relations.
The organization condemned Kilo's arrest and expressed its shock over the measure, "especially as Kilo represents political moderation in Syria," and called for his immediate release.
Kilo, 66, a prominent writer and a moderate critic of the Syrian government, formerly wrote articles in the Lebanese paper An-Nahar.
Copyright 2006 dpa Deutsche Presse-Agentur GmbH
