A year later, the family of slain Hezbollah critic Lokman Slim is demanding accountability

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Issued on: 02/01/2022 – 09:00

A year after the murder of Lebanese intellectual and Hezbollah critic Lokman Slim, his family is still seeking accountability in a country where crimes often go unpunished.

“We really need justice for Lokman,” his widow Monika Borgmann told AFP from their home in the southern suburbs of the capital Beirut, days before the first anniversary of his assassination.

If her murder goes unpunished, it would be like ‘giving the killers the green light, whoever they are, to continue’ their crimes, she said, amid stalled investigations into her murder.

A secular activist from a Shia family, Slim, 58, was found dead in his car on February 4, a day after his family reported him missing.

His body was found in southern Lebanon, a stronghold of the Iran-backed Hezbollah movement, but the culprits have not yet been identified.

An outspoken activist and researcher passionate about documenting the civil war that raged from 1975 to 1990 in Lebanon, Slim was a divisive figure. His hold over foreign diplomats in Lebanon has often drawn the ire of Hezbollah and its supporters.

In several television interviews, Slim accused the group of holding Lebanon hostage on behalf of its Iranian bosses.

In one of his last television appearances, he accused the Syrian regime of having links to the shipment of ammonium nitrate that caused the catastrophic explosion in the port of Beirut in August 2020.

Slim’s family has not received any updates from authorities since the investigation into his murder began.

This is not unusual for a country where even investigations into the Beirut port explosion have yet to identify a single culprit – a year and a half after the blast destroyed swaths of the city.

‘Information gathering’

Justice is still working to collect evidence from security agencies about Slim’s murder, a judicial source said, explaining that the investigations are still in an “information-gathering phase”.

They have yet to draw key conclusions as not all security agencies have provided investigators with the necessary information, the same source added.

Borgmann, Slim’s widow, said the family was left in the dark.

“We don’t really know where we’re going,” she said, expressing doubts about whether progress will ever be made.

German documentarian Monika Borgmann, widow of slain Lebanese prominent activist and intellectual Lokman Slim, poses for a photograph during a studio photo shoot at her residence in the southern suburbs of Beirut on January 26, 2022 Joseph EID AFP

Slim’s family has called for an independent international investigation into his murder. It’s a demand that Borgmann says is within reach after United Nations experts last year called for a credible and impartial investigation.

“The government should consider requesting international technical assistance to investigate the murder of Mr. Slim,” UN human rights experts said in March.

Lebanese politicians and media figures suspected Hezbollah’s involvement in his assassination, but Slim’s family never publicly accused the party of his assassination.

“Of course I have my opinion on who is behind (the murder),” said Borgmann, a director from Germany.

“But for me, it’s not really enough to just point fingers at anybody and… stop there,” she added.

“We need proof and we need accountability,” she said, expressing hope that her killers will be jailed.

Borgmann said Hezbollah threatened Slim on several occasions, including in December 2019.

A group of people attacked his house in the southern suburbs of Beirut, plastering Hezbollah slogans and messages on the walls, calling him a traitor and warning him that his “time will come”.

At the time, Slim said he would blame the Shia movements Hezbollah and Amal if anything happened to him or his family.

“Lokman said it himself,” Borgmann said.

“Believe in Justice”

There have been at least 220 murders and attempted murders since Lebanon’s independence in 1943 until Slim’s murder last year, according to Beirut-based consultancy Information International.

Investigations into these murders have rarely yielded results due to political interference or a lack of evidence.

After his assassination, Slim’s family started a foundation in his name dedicated to the study of political assassinations in Lebanon and the region.

“Political assassinations have played a major role in controlling political life in Arab societies,” said Hana Jaber, director of the foundation.

They create “imaginary barriers…that deter societies from thinking freely or producing alternative political, societal and cultural projects”.

As a result, the foundation created in Slim’s honor will work to counter the culture of impunity around political killings and “break the isolation of those at risk”, Jaber said.

For Borgmann, the foundation will serve to preserve Slim’s legacy.

“Combating the culture of impunity has always been at the center of our work,” she said.

“Now we have to do it without him, but for him.”

(AFP)

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