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UN Hariri probe implicates Syria
A UN inquiry into the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri says many leads point to the direct involvement of Syrian officials.
UN investigators said they had also found evidence of Lebanese collusion in Mr Hariri's death last February.
The report, prepared at the request of UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, says the car bombing was carried out by a group with extensive organisation.
Both Syria and Lebanon have denied the allegations of official involvement.
Syria's Information Minister Mehdi Dakhlallah condemned the findings as "politically biased" deceptions and said the report was "far from the truth".
The Lebanese presidency issued a statement denying that a suspect implicated in Hariri's assassination had called President Emile Lahoud minutes before the truck bomb exploded.
"The press office in the presidential palace categorically denies this information, which has no basis in truth and is a part of a pressure campaign against the president," it said.
A spokesman for the US state department meanwhile said the report was "deeply troubling".
Many in Lebanon blamed Syria for the killing, a claim denied by Damascus.
Troops have been deployed in the Lebanese capital, Beirut, and other cities in case of violence in the wake of the inquiry's findings.
'Lebanese collusion'
The UN team's report said there was "converging evidence pointing at both Lebanese and Syrian involvement in this terrorist act".
Mr Hariri's assassination - for which the likely motive was political - was complex and had obviously been planned for months, the report says.
As such, it "could not have been taken without the approval of top-ranked Syrian security officials and could not have been further organised without the collusion of their counterparts in the Lebanese security services".
The inquiry established that "many leads point directly towards Syrian security officials as being involved with the assassination".
The investigators, led by German magistrate Detlev Mehlis, say the Syrian authorities co-operated only to a degree and accuse several interviewees of "trying to mislead the investigation".
They also accuse Syrian Foreign Minister Farouq al-Shara of lying in a letter sent to the commission.
The investigation is not complete, the report said, with several lines of inquiry still to be pursued.
'Impending crisis'
The UN Security Council will be briefed on 25 October by Mr Mehlis, who handed over the report to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan on Thursday.
John Bolton, the US ambassador to the UN, said several countries had been consulting on what steps to take based on the report's findings.
"We're going to study it very carefully, and based on what's in there, decide what our next course of action might be," he said.
The BBC's Ian Pannell in Damascus says it is widely believed that the Syrian authorities were angered by Mr Hariri's growing opposition to their influence in Lebanon.
Although Syria's President Bashar al-Assad constantly denies any involvement in the killing, the report will add to the sense of impending crisis felt in the country, our correspondent says.
Syria finds itself almost completely isolated, with little support from other Arab nations, and faces the prospect of crippling UN sanctions, he adds.
Syria was the main power in Lebanon until its military withdrawal earlier this year.
Since Mr Hariri was killed on 14 February, a series of bomb attacks have targeted anti-Syrian journalists and politicians as well as Christian areas in Lebanon.
Mr Hariri's son, Saad, has said he wants those implicated by Mr Mehlis' report to be tried by an international court.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4362698.stm
The report, prepared at the request of UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, says the car bombing was carried out by a group with extensive organisation.
Both Syria and Lebanon have denied the allegations of official involvement.
Syria's Information Minister Mehdi Dakhlallah condemned the findings as "politically biased" deceptions and said the report was "far from the truth".
The Lebanese presidency issued a statement denying that a suspect implicated in Hariri's assassination had called President Emile Lahoud minutes before the truck bomb exploded.
"The press office in the presidential palace categorically denies this information, which has no basis in truth and is a part of a pressure campaign against the president," it said.
A spokesman for the US state department meanwhile said the report was "deeply troubling".
Many in Lebanon blamed Syria for the killing, a claim denied by Damascus.
Troops have been deployed in the Lebanese capital, Beirut, and other cities in case of violence in the wake of the inquiry's findings.
'Lebanese collusion'
The UN team's report said there was "converging evidence pointing at both Lebanese and Syrian involvement in this terrorist act".
Mr Hariri's assassination - for which the likely motive was political - was complex and had obviously been planned for months, the report says.
As such, it "could not have been taken without the approval of top-ranked Syrian security officials and could not have been further organised without the collusion of their counterparts in the Lebanese security services".
The inquiry established that "many leads point directly towards Syrian security officials as being involved with the assassination".
The investigators, led by German magistrate Detlev Mehlis, say the Syrian authorities co-operated only to a degree and accuse several interviewees of "trying to mislead the investigation".
They also accuse Syrian Foreign Minister Farouq al-Shara of lying in a letter sent to the commission.
The investigation is not complete, the report said, with several lines of inquiry still to be pursued.
'Impending crisis'
The UN Security Council will be briefed on 25 October by Mr Mehlis, who handed over the report to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan on Thursday.
John Bolton, the US ambassador to the UN, said several countries had been consulting on what steps to take based on the report's findings.
"We're going to study it very carefully, and based on what's in there, decide what our next course of action might be," he said.
The BBC's Ian Pannell in Damascus says it is widely believed that the Syrian authorities were angered by Mr Hariri's growing opposition to their influence in Lebanon.
Although Syria's President Bashar al-Assad constantly denies any involvement in the killing, the report will add to the sense of impending crisis felt in the country, our correspondent says.
Syria finds itself almost completely isolated, with little support from other Arab nations, and faces the prospect of crippling UN sanctions, he adds.
Syria was the main power in Lebanon until its military withdrawal earlier this year.
Since Mr Hariri was killed on 14 February, a series of bomb attacks have targeted anti-Syrian journalists and politicians as well as Christian areas in Lebanon.
Mr Hariri's son, Saad, has said he wants those implicated by Mr Mehlis' report to be tried by an international court.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4362698.stm
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Led by veteran German prosecutor Detlev Mehlis, the probe into the 14 February killing of al-Hariri has established "that many leads point directly towards Syrian security officials as being involved with the assassination".
The report was handed over to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan on Thursday morning, and Annan transmitted the report to the 15-nation Security Council and the Lebanese government on Thursday evening.
The report said it was well known that Syrian military intelligence had a pervasive presence in Lebanon at least until the withdrawal of Syrian forces in line with UN Security Council resolution 1559.
"Given the infiltration of Lebanese institutions and society by the Syrian and Lebanese intelligence services working in tandem, it would be difficult to envisage a scenario whereby such a complex assassination plot could have been carried out without their knowledge," the report said.
Because of this, it is now incumbent on Syria "to clarify a considerable part of the unresolved questions" facing investigators, the report said.
The Mehlis commission said its findings to date indicated that the truck bombing that killed al-Hariri and 20 others in the streets of Beirut was carried out by a group "with an extensive organisation and considerable resources and capabilities".
Planned crime
The strongly worded report by Mehlis said the Syrian and Lebanese intelligence services kept tabs on al-Hariri before his assassination by wiretapping his phone, and there was evidence a telecommunications antenna was jammed near the scene of the car bomb that killed him.
"The crime had been prepared over the course of several months," it said.
It cited Ahmad Abdel-Al, a member of the Ahbash group in Lebanon with strong historical ties to the Syrian authorities, as a significant figure in the assassination plot, as he had used his mobile phone with "all the important figures in this investigation".
There were numerous contracts between Abdel-Al and Lebanese state security on the day of the blast, including Brigadier-General Faysal Rasheed, chief of state security in Beirut, and others, the report said.
Abdel-Al's brother, Mahmoud Abdel-Al "made a call minutes
before the blast, at 1247 hours, to the mobile phone of Lebanese President Emile Lahoud", it said.
Call to Lahoud
The report also said that Syrian officials including Foreign Minister Faruq al-Shara had sought to mislead its investigation.
"While the Syrian authorities, after initial hesitation, have cooperated to a limited degree ... several interviewees tried to mislead the investigation," the commission said in its report.
"The letter addressed to the commission by the foreign minister of the Syrian Arab Republic proved to contain false information," it said.
The report said a Syrian witness living in Lebanon who claimed to have worked for Syrian intelligence in Lebanon told the commission that "senior Lebanese and Syrian officials decided to assassinate Rafiq al-Hariri" about two weeks after the UN Security Council adopted a resolution in September 2004 demanding the withdrawal of Syrian forces from Lebanon.
The witness, who was not identified, claimed a senior Lebanese security official went to Syria several times to plan the crime. At the beginning of January 2005, a high-ranking Syrian officer posted in Lebanon told the witness that "Hariri was a big problem to Syria".
"Approximately a month later the officer told the witness that there soon would be an 'earthquake' that would re-write the history of Lebanon," the report said.
UN probe
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan gave the probe a three-month mandate when it began its work on 16 June but said it could be extended for three more months if necessary. In August, Mehlis received an extension beyond the original 15 September deadline.
Mehlis said the investigation is not complete and must be
continued with Lebanese judicial and security authorities
in the lead.
Al-Hariri's death led to demonstrations against Syria and magnified the international pressure on Damascus to withdraw its troops, which it eventually did. The Security Council approved a probe into al-Hariri's assassination on 8 April.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/F3ED92D8-EDA9-4C3A-895D-97E3B554FBB8.htm
"It is a political statement against Syria based on allegations by witnesses known for their hostility to Syria," Mehdi Dakhlallah, Syria's information minister, told Aljazeera in the first official reaction from Damascus to the report.
Dakhlallah described the report as "100% politically biased" and said it was far from the truth.
The UN report implicated Syrian security services in the murder of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq al-Hariri.
Led by veteran German prosecutor Detlev Mehlis, the probe into the 14 February assassination cited "converging evidence" of Syrian and Lebanese involvement and accused Damascus of blocking and misleading the investigation.
"There is probable cause to believe that the decision to assassinate ... could not have been taken without the approval of top-ranked Syrian security officials and could not have been further organised without the collusion of their counterparts in the Lebanese security services," the report said.
Syria, which pulled out its troops from Lebanon in April amid an international outcry over the al-Hariri killing, is bracing for possible international sanctions over the report.
Lebanon denial
Lebanon also criticised the report, with President Emile Lahoud denying he had any contact with a suspect named by the UN report, the presidential office said on Friday.
Syria has rejected a UN investigation into the murder of a former Lebanese premier, calling it politically biased.
"It is a political statement against Syria based on allegations by witnesses known for their hostility to Syria," Mehdi Dakhlallah, Syria's information minister, told Aljazeera in the first official reaction from Damascus to the report.
Dakhlallah described the report as "100% politically biased" and said it was far from the truth.
The UN report implicated Syrian security services in the murder of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq al-Hariri.
Led by veteran German prosecutor Detlev Mehlis, the probe into the 14 February assassination cited "converging evidence" of Syrian and Lebanese involvement and accused Damascus of blocking and misleading the investigation.
"There is probable cause to believe that the decision to assassinate ... could not have been taken without the approval of top-ranked Syrian security officials and could not have been further organised without the collusion of their counterparts in the Lebanese security services," the report said.
Syria, which pulled out its troops from Lebanon in April amid an international outcry over the al-Hariri killing, is bracing for possible international sanctions over the report.
Lebanon denial
Lebanon also criticised the report, with President Emile Lahoud denying he had any contact with a suspect named by the UN report, the presidential office said on Friday.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/13F8B02D-EEBD-4F97-A918-4A807B708FC1.htm
So let's take this accusation with a grain of salt. Syria had nothing to gain and a lot to lose. Israel, on the other hand would benefit greatly. So would the Anglo-American adventurers in Iraq. They can't attack Iran with the Syrian military at their back. The Iranian Sunburns would sink every American ship in the Gulf. The Anglo-American expeditionary force would suddenly be trapped without supplies, and no way to retreat except into Kurdistan, where they can be expected to wear out their welcome rather quickly.
The Shi'ite militias would rise in the south to support the Iranians. The Syrians would strike from the north, and the Anglo-American expeditionary force would have to flee to Kurdistan, surrender or be slaughtered. It would Teutoburger Wald all over again.
As a side effect, Israel would be destroyed. It would not go down alone. It would exercise what it calls the "Sampson Option," and take every city within range down with them. The radiation would spread throughout the atmosphere and linger for decades.
On the other hand, if Syria is first neutralized, or at least off balance and threatened enough to have to keep most of it's troops on its western border. In such a case, the mad fools who rule us may believe they can actually get away with attacking Iran, and actually try it.
There is some question as to whether the Israeli air force could pull off another Osiraq type attack. There are a great many targets, the distance involved is a lot greater and there is no way they could fly through the Anglo-American controlled airspace over Iraq without the permission of their masters. However, they have submarines off the coast of Iran, presumably armed with nuclear tipped cruise missiles. They could force the issue. The Anglo-American empire would be dragged in because everybody on earth would assume it was their doing.
In that case, Israel must neutralize Syria first. If not, they could easily have to fight the Syrians themselves. They don't want to do this because even though they would eventually win, it would a Pyhrric victory because Syria has it's own version of the "Sampson Option." They (presumably) don't have nukes, but they do have CBW and missiles to deliver it. They could wipe Israel out.
So it is unlikely that Israel, let alone Anglo-America, will attack Iran before Syria is neutralized, or at least severely weakened. That's the motive for framing the Syrians in this murder. It's most likely a false flag op, most likely by the Israel, perhaps with support from Anglo-America.
"This will further tighten the noose around Damascus," Abdullah Al-Ashal, a former assistant to the Egyptian foreign minister and an international law expert, told IslamOnline.net.
"The US will now step its pressures further to shake the Syrian regime to its foundation in order to get it under its thumb."
German judge Detlev Mehlis, leading an international team investigating the massive bomb blast that killed Hariri and 20 others in Beirut in February, said he found "converging evidence" of Syrian and Lebanese involvement and accused Damascus of blocking and misleading the investigation.
The 53-page report, released in New York on Thursday, October 20, said the probe was still incomplete.
In an accompanying letter to the report, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan extended the mission of the team until December 15.
US President George Bush asked the UN Friday, October 21, for an "immediate action" against Syria.
Immediately rejected the findings as "politically biased," Syria accused Mehlis of preparing a report to underpin Washington's rhetorical assault on the country.
"It looks really as if Mehlis was trying his best to get information linking Syrian and Lebanese to the killing rather than find an answer to the key question: who assassinated Hariri?" said Ashal.
Sanctions
The Egyptian expert expected the US to push for international sanctions on Syria and the setting up of an international tribunal to try implicated Syrian officials, especially after some of them had been named by Mehlis.
An unedited version of the UN report said Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad's brother Maher and brother-in-law, Maj. Gen. Asef Shawkat, were among a group of Syrian and Lebanese officials who "decided to assassinate" Hariri in mid-September 2004 and then planned the murder during a series of meetings in Damascus.
Those names were edited out of the final document.
Ashaal, however, ruled out a US military action against Syria, opposed by heavyweight Russia and China.
"The US wouldn’t risk a new military adventure and would focus now how to weaken the regime," he said.
But Qasim Qasir, a Lebanese political analyst, said military action remains an option.
"The report is in effect creating an optimal war atmosphere for the wartime Bush administration," he said.
Newsweek recently reported that the military was considering plans to conduct special operations inside Syria, using small covert teams for cross-border intelligence gathering.
Bargain
Akram Al-Beni, a Syrian opposition journalist, forecast a "bargain" between Washington and Damascus to ease the tensions.
"The Americans see eye to eye with the Israelis and the Europeans that the best way is to lead the Syrian regime by the nose not to oust it," he said.
Al-Beni maintained that the US fears that toppling the Syrian regime might put the Islamists at the helm, which harms its interests and Israel's.
"The only way out for the regime is to entrench democracy, de-muzzle the press and unleash freedoms."
Ali Al-Amin, a Lebanese political analyst, said the US does not have an "alternative" to the Assad regime.
"Washington would, therefore, lay more pressures on Syria to give concessions and serve the US interests in the region," he expected.
Citing senior US and Arab officials, The Times newspaper reported on Saturday, October 15, that the Bush administration has offered Syria normal ties in swap for cooperation over Iraq, Lebanon and Mideast peace, a British newspaper reported on Saturday, October 15.
The deal hinges on full cooperation with the UN inquiry, an end to alleged recruiting, funding and training of volunteers to join the resistance in Iraq as well as an end to support for Lebanon ’s Hezbollah and Palestinian resistance groups.
http://islamonline.net/English/News/2005-10/22/article03.shtml