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The Minister of Culture in the caretaker government, Muhammad Wissam al-Murtada, responded in a statement, “To the offensive and sectarian speech that was issued by the former minister, Richard Kouyoumjian, once morest President Nabih Berri and the Shiite community.”
And he said: “I read in some references that the administrator, Ohans Pasha Kouyoumjian, was described as having good qualities, praiseworthy conduct, wide knowledge, with honorable manners and dignified qualities, and that he loved all the Lebanese without distinction, and he never offended the faith of any of their groups or one of their individuals.”
And he continued, “As I now contemplate what we have become in this time of al-Ruwaidhi, I remember that adage: Tongues do not find their pleasure except in stirring up strife and directing insults, worthy of being quarantined in the tubes of silence.”
