Ex-Syrian diplomat convicted of rape in Switzerland found living as 'refugee' in France
A FORMER Syrian diplomat convicted of a brutal rape in Switzerland in 2001 has been arrested in France living under a false identity as a refugee.
An ex-Syrian diplomat and convicted rapist was found living as a refugee in France
The man, whose name was not revealed, was sentenced in 2001 to 13 years in prison for the 1997 rape of a 60-year-old woman that amounted to torture.
The Geneva court cited the "unbearable severity" and perversity of his acts against the woman he had met at a spa.
Previously a Syrian diplomat to the United Nations in Geneva, he had been living in Versailles "under a new identity, with the status of a political refugee".
He was arrested on Tuesday, the Geneva prosecutor's office said.
Swiss judicial authorities were making an extradition request to France so that he would serve his prison term in Switzerland, it added.
The woman was brutally raped after meeting the attacker at a spa
The ex-diplomat had denied the charges and lost his diplomatic immunity when Swiss authorities demanded it from the Syrian government.
He was called back urgently to Damascus in late 1997, Vincent Derouand of the Geneva prosecutor's office said.
Mr Derouand said: "About a year later he was arrested in Germany and extradited to Switzerland.
"He was held in preventive detention but then released on bail and fled."
The Syrian politician returned to Damascus after the brutal attack
The daily Le Temps paper said in December 2001 that the bail had amounted to 100,000 Swiss francs.
The man, who returned to Damascus, failed to appear at his trial, the newspaper said, adding that he was 35 years old when the crimes were committed.