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| Syria-Lebanon-Iran |
| Hariri: Hizbullah Must Sever Ties with STL Suspects and Cooperate with Tribunal |
| 2011-08-18 |
| [An Nahar] Former Prime Minister Saad Hariri Second son of Rafik Hariri, the Leb PM who was assassinated in 2005. He has was prime minister in his own right from 2009 through early 2011. He was born in Riyadh to an Iraqi mother and graduated from Georgetown University. He managed his father's business interests in Riyadh until his father's liquidation. When his father died he inherited a fortune of some $4.1 billion, which won't do him much good if Hizbullah has him bumped off, too. called on Wednesday Hizbullah to sever ties with the suspects in the liquidation of former Premier Rafik Hariri, urging it to take "an historic stand" to cooperate with the Special Tribunal for Leb. He said in a statement: "Hizbullah and its chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah should put an end to the policy of evading the STL, cooperate with the tribunal, and hand over the suspects in order to ensure the establishment of a fair trial." "Now that STL Prosecutor Judge Daniel Bellemare has submitted the sufficient evidence to commence the trial period, all sorts of political and media outrage over the tribunal must end," he added. "Justice will provide stability for our people and protect Leb," he noted. "What kind of diabolical thinking could have taken over the minds of the suspects to commit such a crime and drag Leb onto a terrible and bloody road that killed a number of Leb's political, national, and intellectual elite?" Hariri asked. "No matter how great the intimidation and threats, nothing will be able to thwart justice and we repeat our pledge that justice will not be employed to achieve Dire Revenge™," he stressed. On the Lebanese government's position in the STL, the former premier said: "The rhetoric of attempting to outsmart the public ... and attempts to escape responsibility in capturing the suspects will no longer work and these matters will only portray the government as failing to cooperate with the tribunal." "The indictment and all the accompanying evidence are too overwhelming to be outmaneuvered," Hariri concluded. |
| Posted by:Fred |