Samar Yahya Saudi Gazette JEDDAH – The Lebanese Consul General, Ziad Atallah, held a reception on the occasion of book signing of “Secrets of Lebanon War” part 2 by Alain Menargues, ex-general manager and reporter of French international radio in Lebanon from 1982 – 1998, as part of “Francophone Week” at his residence here Saturday evening. Atallah expressing his pride that Lebanon is part of the Francophone countries. He thanked all the distinguished guests, consuls, ambassadors, businessmen among others who attended the event. “Today, I'm very pleased to welcome Menargues, the French, Lebanese Arab writer, who lived in Lebanon during the war. In documenting the time of war he faced three main challenges: first, documenting political events that happened not long ago; “secondly, documenting events in Lebanon where it is difficult to find out absolute truth or even relative truth, it is always a political point of view; “and thirdly, he has penned events that took place about 30 years ago and he can guarantee the events' details,” Atallah said. Atallah also said that Menargues is now working on his third book which will highlight the 2006 Lebanon war. “To write a book about the 2006 war reveals the writer's erudition, audacity and professionalism,” the consul general said. Menargues said that writing is a difficult process. “Writing my (the) two books was really difficult as I was documenting events and incidents about people who are present and I have to define every single incident. “If we talk about the 2006 war, most of us have more or less some information about it. When we delve deep into details we find out things that we never thought of,” he said. Talking about his books' writing process, Menargues said he had to do a lot of research as he had to speak with diverse parties and people to get the correct information about the events. “It took me five years to write my book on 2006 War, out of which I spent four years in research and documentation and the fifth year writing,” Menargues said, adding that he had to review around 60,000 pages before he could finalize 1,200 pages of both his books. Menargues signed copies of his second books for guests. Both his books were available for purchase at the event. The guests also took this opportunity to discuss Menargues' books with him.
