Prague, Nov 10 (CTK) – The Czech Republic wants to strengthen the protection of its embassy in Beirut due to the worsened security situation in Lebanon, daily Pravo writes yesterday.
Foreign Minister Lubomir Zaoralek has asked Interior Minister Milan Chovanec (both Social Democrats, CSSD) to send two elite police from the rapid reaction squad to the embassy in Beirut.
Both ministers will submit the respective proposal to the government that must approve it since the 3.3-million-crown costs of the mission, now planned to last six months, will be released from its budget reserve, Pravo writes.
“The worsening security situation considerably increases the risks faced by Czech diplomatic officials at the embassy in Beirut,” Pravo cites a report for the government.
Lebanon has long been threatened by the war in the neighbouring Syria as well as by an internal unrest. The Foreign Ministry has assessed some parts of the country as dangerous for Czech citizens, the paper says.
The document for the cabinet also points out the kidnapping of five Czechs in Lebanon in July that has not been successfully investigated yet.
“Another risk to the diplomatic mission is the situation around Ali Fayad, a Lebanese citizen detained in the Czech Republic at a U.S. request,” the report writes.
Fayad, who has been taken into custody in the Czech Republic on suspicion of support for terrorists, is a brother of the taxi driver from whose car the Czechs, including Fayad´s lawyer, were kidnapped.
According to Pravo´s sources, Lebanese gunmen abducted the Czechs in order to exchange them for Fayad, or at least to prevent his extradition to the USA.
“The Lebanese circles striving for Fayad´s release have staged two protest demonstrations outside the Czech embassy, which also poses an apparent security risk though serious incidents have been avoided,” the document says.
The Interior Ministry has provided the protection of Czech diplomatic missions in risky destinations since 2003.
At present, police experts serve at the embassies in Damascus and Baghdad as well as at the general consulate in Erbil, Iraq. In 2006, they were deployed in Beirut, in 2006-2010 in Kabul and in 2011-2014 in Tripolis. Since 2010, soldiers from the special force unit have been guarding the embassy in Kabul, Pravo writes.
The costs of the police protection of Czech embassies and consulates amount to dozens of millions of crowns a year. This year, almost 42.5 million crowns have been spent on it, Pravo writes, referring to a report for the government.
($1=25.090 crowns)
