Abu Rateb

KUWAIT CITY, Jan 7: The leader of Syrian rebel group Ahrar al-Sham Al-Islamiya (the Islamic Movement of the Free Men in the Levant) in Homs province has been killed in an ambush, according to a statement from the group, reports Al-Rai daily.

The killing of Abu Rateb al-Homsi Tuesday evening comes just weeks after Zahran Alloush, leader of rebel group Jaish al-Islam, was killed in an air strike claimed by the Syrian government, and follows a string of deaths among local rebel leaders and imams in the central Syrian province in recent months.

Abu Rateb, according to the leader of the group, was a friend of Kuwaitis in Syria and had met with a big number of them including Sharqan Al-Kuwaiti who fought alongside the Al-Aqsa soldiers and was killed last year.

Abu Rateb was reportedly traveling through a village in northern Homs with his wife when two gunmen on motorcycles fired more than 50 bullets at their car. According to sources the rebel leader was shot in the head during the attack. His wife was also seriously injured.

Dead men still own weapons?Director-General of the General Department for Weapons Investigation Major-General Faraj Al-Zua’abi was recently quoted as saying the department has found 2,000 weapons remain registered in the name of persons who had died, reports Al-Kuwaitiah daily. He declared, a committee has been formed to summon the families of the dead to follow up on the issue and amend the legal status of these weapons to either transfer the licence in the name of a legal heir or hand them over to the concerned authority.

Al-Zua’abi continued saying the committee is constantly in touch with those in whose names weapons have been registered but failed to renew the licences saying it is mandatory to either renew the licences or hand them over to the authorities. A reliable source at the department said a memo has been submitted to suspend the transactions of persons who have failed to renew their weapons licences and that they will be officially warned for the first time. The same source said the department has seized 19 weapons and withdrawn 45 weapons licences in the last month of 2015.