American Marconi Wireless News - France court orders release of Lebanese militant after 40 years in jail

Abdallah, 74, is one of the longest-serving prisoners in France, where most convicts on life sentences are freed after less than 30 years.

He has been up for release for 25 years, but the United States -- a civil party to the case -- has consistently opposed him leaving prison.

Abdallah was detained in 1984 and sentenced to life in prison in 1987 for his involvement in the murders of US military attache Charles Robert Ray and Israeli diplomat Yacov Barsimantov in Paris.

Lebanese of Maronite Christian heritage, he has always insisted he is not a "criminal" but a "fighter" for the rights of Palestinians, whom he said were targeted, along with Lebanon, by the United States and Israel.

The Paris Appeals Court ordered he be freed from a prison in the south of France on July 25, on condition that he leave French territory and never return.

It said the length of his detention had been "disproportionate" and that he no longer represented a danger to the public.

Several sources before the hearing said that it was planned for him to be flown to Paris and then to Beirut.

Prosecutors can file an appeal with France's highest court, the Court of Cassation, but any such request is not expected to be processed fast enough to halt his release next week.

- 'Delighted' -

The detainee's brother, Robert Abdallah, in Lebanon told AFP he was overjoyed.

"We're delighted. I didn't expect the French judiciary to make such a decision nor for him to ever be freed, especially after so many failed requests for release," he said.

"For once, the French authorities have freed themselves from Israeli and US pressure," he added.

Lebanese authorities have repeatedly said Abdallah should be freed from jail, and had written to the appeals court to say they would organise his return home.

Abdallah's lawyer Jean-Louis Chalanset also welcomed the decision, calling it a "political scandal he was not released earlier".

Israel's embassy in Paris meanwhile released a statement saying it regretted the decision to release Abdallah.

"Such terrorists, enemies of the free world, should spend their life in prison," it said.

Lebanon's charge d'affaires in Paris, Ziad Taan, told AFP the country was "extremely satisfied" by the decision, adding that Abdallah will be "welcome" in Lebanon.

In November last year, a French court ordered Abdallah to be released on condition that he leave France.

But France's anti-terror prosecutors, arguing that he had not changed his political views, appealed the decision, which was suspended.

A verdict was supposed to have been delivered in February, but the Paris appeals court postponed it over compensation payments.

- 'Past symbol' -

The court re-examined the latest request for his release last month.

During the closed-door hearing, Abdallah's lawyer told the judges that 16,000 euros had been placed in the prisoner's bank account at the disposal of civil parties in the case, including the United States, according to several sources who attended.

Abdallah was wounded as a teenager when Israel invaded Lebanon in 1978 in the early years of the country's civil war.

As an adult, he founded the Lebanese Armed Revolutionary Factions (LARF), a Marxist pro-Syria and anti-Israel group that has now been dissolved.

After his arrest in 1984, French police discovered submachine guns and transceiver stations in one of his Paris apartments.

The appeals court in February however noted that the FARL "had not committed a violent action since 1984" and that Abdallah "today represented a past symbol of the Palestinian struggle".

Lebanon hosts tens of thousands of Palestinians, according to the United Nations, most descendants of those who fled or were expelled from their land during the creation of Israel in 1948.

P.Stevenson--AMWN