The chief UN investigator into the assassination of a former Lebanese premier has reportedly summoned six senior Syrian intelligence officers for questioning. A Lebanese official close to the UN team investigating Rafiq al-Hariri's killing said Detlev Mehlis sent the summons to the Syrian government via the United Nations on Wednesday. "Mr. Mehlis has sent a letter to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan demanding to question at least six Syrian officials," the official told the Associated Press.There was no immediate Syrian comment on the summons due to the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr. The London-based pan-Arab newspaper Al-Hayat reported on Saturday that Mehlis wanted to question six senior Syrian officers at the UN commission's headquarters at the hilltop Monteverde Hotel east of Beirut, and not in Syria. Despite its declared readiness to cooperate with the UN probe into Hariri's killing, the Syrian government, citing the country's sovereignty, is reportedly against allowing Syrian witnesses or suspects to be questioned by UN investigators outside Syria. It is particularly sensitive for Syrians to be questioned in Lebanon because of security concerns for their own safety.
Al-Hayat said the men Mehlis wanted to question included Assad's brother-in-law, General Assef Shawkat, chief of Syria's military intelligence service; Major General Bahjat Suleiman, former chief of Syria's internal intelligence apparatus; and Brigadier General Rustum Ghazale, the last Syrian intelligence chief in Lebanon who was in charge when Hariri was assassinated. The other three senior officers listed in the summons did not include Assad's brother, Maher, whose name was mentioned, along with Shawkat, in Mehlis' report to the Security Council last month. Lebanese prosecutor-general Saeed Mirza declined to comment on Al Hayat's report when contacted by The Associated Press. "I don't know. You have to ask Mr. Mehlis," Mirza said on Saturday.