‘Burgas suspect flew to Lebanon 2 days before attack’

Meliad Farah’s visit may serve as evidence to connections with Hezbollah, alleged to have planned the bombing

By Adiv Sterman 1 August 2013, 6:53 pm

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Adiv Sterman is a breaking news editor at The Times of Israel.

These headshots provided by the Bulgarian Interior Ministry shows Canadian citizen Hassan El Hajj Hassan, right, and Australian citizen Meliad Farah, also known as Hussein Hussein, left, both suspected of being involved in the July 2012 Burgas bombing. (courtesy Bulgarian Interior Ministry)

A suspect in the planning of an attack that killed five Israeli tourists and a Bulgarian bus driver in the resort town of Burgas last July was reported to have flown to Lebanon two days prior to the bombing.

The suspect’s visit to the Middle Eastern country in such proximity to the bombing strengthens indications that he had connections with the Lebanon-based terrorist organization Hezbollah, alleged by Bulgarian authorities to be behind the attack.

Polish news website tvn24.pl reported Thursday that the suspect, Meliad Farah, an Australian citizen also known as Hussein Hussein, boarded a flight from Warsaw to Beirut on July 16, 2012. The news site did not specify how it obtained Farah’s flight information.

According to tvn24.pl reports, Farah, 32, flew from Prague to Warsaw earlier that day.

Last week, Bulgaria made public the name and an image of Farah, along with that of Canadian citizen Hassan El Hajj Hassan, on suspicion that they had both been involved in the attack.

The Bulgarian interior ministry asked anyone who might have seen them to report to the nearest police station.

A third suspect, a suicide bomber who was killed in the blast, has not been identified. Last August, Bulgarian experts produced an image of a young, dark-haired man based on the remains of his body, which was decapitated in the explosion. Fingerprints and DNA samples have not led to results so far.

During their investigation of the bombing, Bulgarian authorities found counterfeit US drivers’ licenses under the names Rico and Martin, both of which contained traces of DNA that matched the DNA of the suspected bomber extracted from the wreckage, establishing a clear link between the three, AFP reported.

The Bulgarian government has long believed Hezbollah was behind the bombing, and in June presented further evidence linking a known operative of the Lebanese Shi’ite terrorist group to the manufacture of the fake IDs used by the suspects.

The EU, partially in response to the new evidence and allegations from Bulgaria, last month blacklisted the military wing of Hezbollah as a terrorist organization.

Gavriel Fisk contributed to this report.