* Army apprehends Fatah al-Islam militant who escaped prison * Audacity of escape prompts criticism of interior minister BEIRUT, Aug 19 (Reuters) - The Lebanese army captured an Islamist militant on Wednesday, a day after he escaped from a high-security prison, security sources said. Security forces combed large parts of Beirut in an effort to apprehend Taha Hajj Suleiman, a Syrian national, who is a member of the al Qaeda-inspired Fatah al-Islam group. He was found in the woods near Roumieh prison, east of Beirut, where he was being held on terrorism charges. Newspaper reports said eight inmates worked for two weeks on their jail break, sawing off the bars from their cell windows, tying bed sheets together to scale down the building and finally forming a human ladder to escape. Hajj Suleiman managed to flee, but prison security officers arrested the seven other inmates, all Fatah al-Islam members, who helped him escape. Interior Minister Ziad Baroud, who has been criticised over the incident, ordered the detention of the prison warden, an officer in charge at the time of the escape and other guards. He also ordered the transfer of all police officers working in prisons. Fatah al-Islam fought the Lebanese army in a 15-week battle at a Palestinian refugee camp in northern Lebanon in 2007. More than 440 people, including 170 soldiers, were killed before the army defeated the militants at the Nahr al-Bared camp. Some of the members of Fatah al-Islam, many of whom came to Lebanon from other Arab countries, were blamed for later bombings and attacks on army targets. (Writing by Yara Bayoumy; editing by Robin Pomeroy)
Lebanon's Hezbollah supporters wave flags as they listen to their leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah's speech through a giant screen during a rally marking the third anniversary of the end of the ...
