UN legal chief calls on Lebanese leaders to demonstrate support for tribunal

It is time for Lebanon’s key political forces to not just express their support for the establishment of a tribunal to try the suspected killers of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, but to demonstrate it, the United Nations Legal Counsel said today as he called on all sides to seek a solution to their impasse on the issue.

Nicolas Michel completed his meetings during his five-day visit to Lebanon by holding another round of talks today with Prime Minister Fuad Siniora and Speaker of the Parliament Nabih Berri, UN spokesperson Michele Montas told journalists.

Mr. Michel has noted that all of his interlocutors during his visit to Lebanon, from Mr. Siniora and Mr. Berri to President Emile Lahoud and other parliamentarians and political figures, have indicated their support for the tribunal to be established.

Now is the time for those figures and their parties to demonstrate that support, he said, adding that such an outcome is possible only if the parties resume their dialogue.

Mr. Michel was dispatched to Beirut by Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to offer legal assistance to the Lebanese as they work towards parliamentary ratification of the agreement on setting up the tribunal, a necessary step for the tribunal to enter into force. Yet Lebanon’s parliamentary forces have been deadlocked on the issue and there has been no vote yet.

Speaking to reporters after his meeting today with Mr. Siniora, Mr. Michel said he hoped the parties would continue to seek a solution to their impasse and he urged them to do so.

The planned tribunal will be of “an international character” to deal with the assassination of Mr. Hariri, who was killed along with 22 others in a massive car bombing in downtown Beirut in February 2005.

Once it is formally established, it will be up to the tribunal to determine whether other political killings in Lebanon since October 2004 were connected to Mr. Hariri’s assassination and could therefore be dealt with by the tribunal.

In April 2005 the Security Council set up the International Independent Investigation Commission (IIIC) after an earlier UN mission found that Lebanon’s own inquiry into the Hariri assassination was seriously flawed and that Syria was primarily responsible for the political tensions that preceded the attack. Its mandate runs out next year.

Serge Brammertz, the current head of the IIIC, told the Council last September that evidence obtained so far suggests that a young, male suicide bomber, probably non-Lebanese, detonated up to 1,800 kilograms of explosives inside a van to assassinate Mr. Hariri.