Prosecutor General: Preparing to Ensure Amnesty Law Implementation Without Delay After Constitutional Council Ruling

Prosecutor General Judge Ahmad Rami Al-Hajj visited the joint central operations room managing general amnesty files at the Gendarmerie headquarters in Jisr El Bacha, as part of preparations for legal and judicial procedures to apply the amnesty law should it be upheld by the Constitutional Council, and to prevent any delay in its implementation.

He was received by Gendarmerie Commander Brigadier General Jean Oueid and representatives from judicial and security agencies, attended by Mount Lebanon Public Prosecutor Judge Sami Sader, Military Court Government Commissioner Judge Claude Ghanem, and those involved in the operations rooms' work.

Judge Al-Hajj stated: "As a preliminary step to implementing the general amnesty law, judicial and security agencies launched a central operations room to monitor the mechanisms for applying the law, parallel to establishing sub-operations rooms in various Lebanese governorates, awaiting the Constitutional Council's decision on the challenge filed against the law."

He affirmed that "this step does not constitute any pressure on the Constitutional Council, but rather comes within the framework of advance preparation to ensure full readiness to implement the law, regardless of the outcome issued by the Constitutional Council, whether it is approved in its current form or amended due to the challenge."

He clarified that "the law, in its current form, did not specify detailed implementation mechanisms, but left the determination of execution procedures to the judiciary, in cooperation with relevant security agencies. Hence, the file preparation process began about three weeks ago, aiming not to wait until the Constitutional Council's decision is issued and start from scratch."

He indicated that "the central operations room, operating under the supervision of the Prosecutor General's Office, the Military Public Prosecution, and the Mount Lebanon Public Prosecution, monitors files around the clock, while sub-operations rooms are established in the governorates, ensuring continuous communication between the Prosecutor General or his assistants and these rooms."

He noted that "the working mechanism includes preparing a specific file for each convicted person and detainee, containing the rulings issued against them and their criminal records, in addition to collecting documents and information available at various security agencies, from Internal Security Forces, General Security, State Security, to Army Intelligence and Military Police. This procedure aims, specifically, to verify the absence of recidivism cases or previous prosecutions and rulings that may prevent some individuals from benefiting from amnesty provisions."

Judge Al-Hajj explained that "security agencies have begun working on the first batch comprising approximately 900 convicts, gathering all available information about each individual, including previous prosecutions, reports, and documents held by relevant agencies," affirming that "the work covers all convicts and detainees, whether they have legal representatives or not, to ensure equal treatment of files and avoid favoring one person over another. An alphabetical sorting mechanism will be adopted for files, prioritizing individuals who can be released quickly if they meet the amnesty conditions."

He pointed out that "various security agencies participate in this process, alongside the Army, its intelligence, and the Military Police," praising "the efforts made by the Gendarmerie command and officers tasked with preparation and coordination among stakeholders," stressing that "ensuring the successful implementation of the amnesty law, if enacted, is a shared responsibility between the judiciary and security agencies," affirming that "the goal is to implement the law professionally and without delay, away from disputes and political point-scoring."

He also noted that "file preparation will not be futile even if the amnesty law is annulled, as the process will result in creating a database and comprehensive files for convicts and detainees that can be utilized in subsequent judicial stages or procedures."

Judge Al-Hajj expressed "gratitude to entities that contributed to providing material aid and necessary equipment for the operations room, inviting civil society associations to support relevant agencies in securing the large logistical requirements needed for file preparation," indicating that "the work plan includes a central operations room supervised by the Prosecutor General's Office, with participation from the Military Public Prosecution and Mount Lebanon Public Prosecution, alongside sub-operations rooms in the governorates, with two dedicated sub-rooms in Mount Lebanon due to the volume of files and higher pressure there."

According to available data, Judge Al-Hajj indicated that "preparation work covers more than 1,300 convicts, while the total number of detainees and convicts exceeds 2,000, plus more than 5,000 detainees, making the task of preparing and verifying files extensive and requiring coordination among various judicial and security agencies."

He clarified that "ongoing work aims to establish a clear mechanism for applying the law, not interpreting the legislator's intent," noting that "some clauses contain terms and formulations requiring clarification on how to apply them to existing legal texts," and indicated that "coordination with the High Judicial Council aims to unify the application mechanism and prevent discrepancies between prosecutors and courts in handling provisions covered by the law, especially since the current amnesty law did not directly specify certain article numbers subject to amnesty or sentence reduction, but relied on general descriptions and terms."

Judge Al-Hajj stressed that "the law is not limited to amnesty but also includes provisions regarding sentence reductions, necessitating sorting files into those eligible for amnesty, those benefiting from sentence reduction, and those not covered by the law," stating that "in the current phase, beneficiaries are not definitively identified, but a comprehensive file is prepared for each convict and detainee, regardless of their eligibility for the law, with the sorting process to be completed later according to the rulings and legal specifics of each file."

Regarding the hunger strike by some detainees and convicts in Roumieh Prison, Judge Al-Hajj clarified that "the establishment of the joint operations room was not linked to the strike; the decision to create it was taken from the first day the amnesty law was issued," noting that "a meeting was held at the Palace of Justice, involving the Gendarmerie command and prison unit leadership, to establish a working mechanism for implementing the law before the challenge was filed with the Constitutional Council. At the same time, we understand the situation of detainees and convicts waiting to know their fate after the amnesty law's issuance," considering it "natural for them to view the law as an opportunity for release."

He affirmed that "the scale of required work is significant," citing "the process of handing over approximately 300 Syrian detainees to Syrian authorities, which took about a month and a half to prepare and verify files," explaining that "implementing the amnesty law will be more complex due to the large number of convicts and the variety of rulings issued against some by different courts."

He viewed that "the importance of the central operations room, which collects information, unifies files, sorts them, and determines the competent judicial reference for each case, lies in enabling accelerated decision-making after the final ruling on the amnesty law."

He stressed that "waiting for the Constitutional Council's decision before starting preparations would lead to delays in implementation, given the time needed to collect documents and verify previous rulings and prosecutions," affirming that "the aim of advance work is to have files ready when the decision is issued, allowing quick commencement of releasing beneficiaries, with the process occurring gradually after completing legal verification of each file and determining the applicability of amnesty or sentence reduction conditions."

He confirmed that "measures taken aim to ensure no delay in releasing amnesty law beneficiaries once it enters into force, particularly detainees unable to follow up on their files directly," clarifying that "files will be processed alphabetically to ensure equality among detainees and avoid favoring one file over another, with practical priority given to cases where files are complete and ready for release procedures."

Judge Al-Hajj indicated that "judicial and security preparations for implementing the amnesty law continue through a unified working mechanism aimed at completing files for convicts and detainees and verifying their legal and security status, before referring each file to the competent prosecution for appropriate decisions, whether regarding sentence reduction or release, amidst the need for broad coordination among various security agencies."

He noted that "file preparation proceeds in parallel for convicts and detainees, with the estimated time to complete the first batch being about ten days, covering nearly a thousand people, while the process continues sequentially for remaining files," explaining that "operations rooms work around the clock to save time and ensure readiness, so files are prepared for implementation regardless of the Constitutional Council's decision on the amnesty law, whether fully or partially annulling it or keeping it valid."

Organizational presentation of operations rooms

Subsequently, Internal Security Captain Nicolas Kheirallah gave a detailed presentation on the organizational structure of the general amnesty file management operations rooms, the mechanism for preparing and verifying judicial files, and how coordination occurs among all security agencies.