Tributes As Funeral Held For Slain Lebanese Publisher Lokman Slim

MOURNERS have attended the funeral of a slain Lebanese publisher and outspoken Hezbollah critic whose murder last week provoked a public outcry.

Lokman Slim was found dead with six bullets in his body last week on a deserted rural road in the country’s south, in the first high-profile killing in Lebanon in years that sparked fears of a new wave of political violence amid deepening social and economic turmoil.

Thursday’s memorial service took place at Slim’s family home in the southern suburbs of the capital, Beirut, with relatives, friends and diplomats in attendance.

“Weapons don’t serve the country. They didn’t serve me, they cost me my son,” Salma Mershak, Slim’s mother and an historian, said at the ceremony, calling people to protect his legacy and the country from descending into violence.

The United States ambassador to Lebanon, who was present at the ceremony including ambassadors from Canada, the United Kingdom