Lebanon: 16 charged in February bus bombing case

A Lebanese prosecutor filed terrorism charges against 16 suspects on Thursday, accusing them of commuter bus bombings that killed three people in February, a judicial official said. Of the 16 suspects charged by Prosecutor General Saeed Mirza, nine are in police custody, the official said. They include seven Syrians, a Lebanese man and a Palestinian woman. The official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to give statements to media, told The Associated Press that all 16 belong to the al-Qaida-inspired Fatah Islam group. Members of that same group have for a month now been battling Lebanese army troops in the Palestinian refugee camp of Nahr el-Bared, close to the port city of Tripoli in northern Lebanon.