UK diplomat’s murderer sentenced to death

A criminal court in Lebanon yesterday sentenced an Uber driver to death in connection with the killing of an employee of the British Embassy in Beirut nearly two years ago. The driver, Tarek Houshi, was arrested two days after the body of the diplomat, Rebecca Dykes, 30, was found in December 2017, next to a highway on the outskirts of the Lebanese capital.

Ms. Dykes was believed to have spent the night at a friend’s party in the Gemmayze District of Beirut and was last seen leaving a bar in the area. The National News Agency of Lebanon reported at the time that Mr Houshi, then identified only as Tarek H., had a criminal record and had confessed to the killing of Ms. Dykes, but it was not immediately clear on Friday what crime he had been convicted of.

The sentence can be appealed and is likely to be commuted to life in prison. Lebanon has an unofficial moratorium on the death penalty and has not carried out an execution since 2004, according to the rights group Human Rights Watch. Ms. Dykes had worked at the British Embassy with the Department for International Development. She was found strangled with a rope, and there were signs she had been sexually assaulted.

Uber has been under intense scrutiny around the globe for its work culture and its poor oversight of drivers. In 2014, Uber and one of its competitors, Lyft, lobbied regulators in cities across the United States to ease rules requiring the fingerprinting of drivers for background checks, a more thorough but time-consuming process.