Hezbollah Official Forced Out of Germany

A German court confirmed Wednesday that a representative of Lebanon’s Shiite Muslim fundamentalist group Hezbollah will have to leave the country despite living here for 20 years. The court in Düsseldorf ruled that the government was within its rights to deny the unidentified man a visa because he “is a member of an organization that supports international terrorism.” Although the group is not included on a European Union list of terrorist organizations, the court said Germany was “not legally bound” by the list. The Lebanese man first arrived in Germany in 1985 and was refused asylum but was given a visa for “humanitarian reasons” by authorities in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, although the document had to be periodically renewed. The extension was refused in 2003 when the man’s political affiliation became known.