BEIRUT: A Lebanese court sentenced a man to death in absentia for killing an Irish United Nations peacekeeper, a judicial official said Tuesday, after Hezbollah members were accused of involvement in the 2022 incident.
Private Sean Rooney, 23, was killed and three others were wounded after a UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) convoy came under fire on December 14, 2022 in south Lebanon, long a stronghold of the Iran-backed militant group.
The judicial official, requesting anonymity as they were not authorized to brief the media, said Lebanon’s military court issued its ruling in the case at around midnight on Monday.
The court “imposed the death sentence... on the main defendant, Mohammad Ayyad,” the official said, adding that the ruling was issued in absentia.
A security source told AFP in December 2022 that Hezbollah had handed Ayyad over to the army that month.
