Aoun slams March 14: Hasan is Lebanon\'s martyr

Free Patriotic Movement chief MP Michel Aoun Sunday described slain Brig. Gen. Wissam Hasan as the “nation’s martyr” and slammed the March 14 coalition for using his death for political reasons. “We consider Brig. Gen. Wissam al-Hasan and those who fell with him as Lebanon’s martyrs and we join everyone in honoring him,” Aoun said in a televised news conference from Rabieh, north of Beirut. “Some are portraying him as their own martyr and that reflects negatively on the meaning of martyrdom and they are moving him away from the nation and into a political dispute,” he added. The assassination of Hasan in a car bomb Friday drew strong condemnations from across the country’s political spectrum, particularly from the March 14 coalition who immediately called for the resignation of the government. Hasan was the head of the Internal Security Forces’ Information Branch. March 14 also held Prime Minister Najib Mikati’s Cabinet responsible for Hasan’s blood and asked their supporters to turn for the security chief’s burial ceremony at Downtown Beirut. “There is no nobility in a behavior that uses the martyr as political means,” Aoun, a harsh critic of the Information Branch and Hasan, said.