Sign up now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.com Register BEIRUT, Aug 14 (Reuters) – The father of a man accused of attempting to assassinate novelist Salman Rushdie has locked himself in his home in southern Lebanon and is refusing to speak to anyone, the city’s mayor, Ali Tehfe, said on Sunday. The suspect in Friday’s attack in New York state has been identified by police as 24-year-old Hadi Mattar of New Jersey. He has pleaded not guilty. Matar is originally Lebanese and his family hails from the southern Lebanese city of Yaroun. read more Tehfe said his parents immigrated to the United States and Matar was born and raised there, but his father returned to Lebanon several years ago. Sign up now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.com Register “His father is now in the country, but he’s locked up and won’t give any statement to anyone. We tried with him, sent people, went and knocked on the door, but he won’t talk. anyone,” Tehfe told Reuters. An official with the Iranian-backed Lebanese armed group Hezbollah said on Saturday that the group had no additional information about the attack on Rushdie. “We don’t know anything about this matter, so we won’t comment,” the official told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity. Hezbollah is backed by Iran, whose former supreme leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, in 1989 issued a fatwa, or religious edict, calling on Muslims to kill Rushdie for blasphemy. When asked if Matar or his parents were affiliated with or supported Hezbollah, Tehfe said he had “absolutely no information” about the political views of the parents or Matar. Indian-born Rushdie, 75, was off a ventilator and his condition was improving, his agent and a son said Sunday. Sign up now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.com Register Report by Timour Azhari. Editing by Nick Macfie Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
