Army Arrests Lebanese for Trying to Smuggle Syrians, Palestinians to Turkey

The army announced on Saturday the arrest of a Lebanese national and a number of Syrians and Palestinians, who were being illegally smuggled to Turkey.

It said that they were arrested overnight as they were attempting to travel to Turkey by boat from the northern city of Tripoli.

The Lebanese national was trying to smuggle them.

All of them have since been returned to shore and investigations are underway with them.

In October, 36 Lebanese and Palestinian migrants were detained for trying to illegally leave Lebanon through the Sarafand port.

That same month, the navy thwarted a similar attempt in Tripoli, where 53 people were trying to illegally leave the country.

Media reports said that Lebanese migrants from the North have exceeded 2,000, while this number tops 4,500 when departures from Beirut's Rafik Hariri International Airport are included.