To the relief of Damascus, the UN's latest report on the assassination of Al-Hariri contains no speculation and confirms Syria's cooperation with the enquiry, reports Sami Moubayed As expected, the second report of UN investigator Serge Brammertz on the assassination of Lebanon's former Prime Minister Rafik Al-Hariri carried no surprises. Brammertz has requested that his mandate be extended for another year to complete the investigation. The latest report is detailed, balanced and technical, steering clear of the high drama created by Brammertz's predecessor, Detlev Mehlis. The 30-page document, based on a staggering five billion records, outlines what Brammertz describes as a "snap-shot" of the different layers of the murder -- those who committed it, those who had knowledge of it, and those who commissioned it. In essence, the report reveals that little has been discovered on who killed Al-Hariri or why he was killed. Indeed, little conclusive has thus far been established on how he was killed. It is staggering that 16 months after the 14 February 2005 blast that killed the former prime minister, no definitive answer has been given to whether the explosion took place "below ground" or "above ground". Was it one blast, or did two occur simultaneously? Brammertz devotes a bulk of his report to addressing these questions, raising questions as to what Mehlis was doing throughout 2005. Brammertz explains that his final forensic examination of the crime scene began late May 2006. The objective, he adds in section 16 of the report, was to establish whether "the Mitsubishi truck was used to deliver the bomb, whether the device was detonated by an individual, and the exact location of the device when it exploded." The Mitsubishi truck Brammertz refers to is one spotted driving slowly by CCTV cameras of the HSBC bank near the scene of the crime. Its remains were found at the scene, and it was later established that it was smuggled into Lebanon in parts from the United Arab Emirates. Brammertz confirms, in section 22 of his report, that the bombing took place at exactly 12:55:05. He adds that the amount of explosives needed to form a crater similar to the one left behind where Al-Hariri was killed "would be approximately 500 kilogrammes of TNT, at a depth of 1.7 metres under the ground, or 1,200 kilogrammes of TNT if placed above the ground." Around 1,800 kilogrammes of TNT would have been required if the explosives were placed approximately 0.8 metres above ground. Brammertz describes that evidence collected from soil inside of the crater indicates that the TNT was "most likely placed above the ground; the explosion having driven it downwards into the ground." He also endorses the scenario that the explosives used were 1,200 kilogrammes of TNT placed inside the Mitsubishi. The UN investigating commission, he adds in section 25 of his report, is still working on how the explosives were placed in the Mitsubishi truck to produce the desired effect. Brammertz adds that an interesting note in section 31, saying that the explosion was not scheduled to take place as Al-Hariri was passing the St George Hotel. Brammertz believes, on the contrary, that the blast was "planned to take place further along the route of the convoy, probably beyond the St George Hotel, but almost certainly not before reaching it, due to logistical and timing issues." The bomb itself, Brammertz asserts in section 35, was detonated by an individual inside or immediately in front of the Mitsubishi truck. The scattering of 27 parts of a human body across the crime scene, all belonging to the same person (a male), give the scenario of the bomb having been transported in the Mitsubishi credibility. Brammertz remarks, "it is likely that he was the individual" who detonated the bomb, cautioning that it not be concluded that he was a suicide bomber because it remains unclear whether he detonated the bomb willingly or was forced to do so by another assailant. Brammertz asserts that the large amount of explosives used "was designed so as to ensure that the killing radius of the shock and pressure wave emanating from the magnitude of the blast would kill Rafik Al-Hariri even if the actual immediate explosion did not." With regard to Ahmed Abu Addas, the man who claimed responsibility for the murder in a recorded video sent to Al-Jazeera television hours after the attack (and who has since disappeared), Brammertz says: "There is no evidence to suggest that Ahmed Abu Addas was present at the crime scene in any capacity on 14 February 2005." He adds, however, "the commission does not exclude the possibility that he was involved in other aspects of the operation beyond his participation in the making of the claim-of-responsibility video message." Finally, the report discusses Syria's role in the investigation in a manner that was greatly welcomed by Damascus. The Syrians are pleased at section 100, which says that President Bashar Al-Assad and Vice-President Farouk Al-Shara, who recently met Brammertz in Damascus, gave answers that were "useful". Mehlis singled out Al-Shara, then minister of foreign affairs, as having lied to the UN investigating commission with regard to Al-Hariri's last meeting with President Assad in August 2004. Brammertz makes no mention of this entire meeting where, according to anti-Syrian statesmen in Lebanon, Al-Assad threatened to "break" Lebanon on Al-Hariri's head if he did not approve the extension of President Emile Lahoud's mandate. In section 103 of his report, Brammertz says, "the level of assistance provided by Syria during the reporting is generally satisfactory." The commission made 16 official requests to Syria, all of which were promptly answered, and Syria also facilitated the interviewing of six of its citizens by the UN commission, as noted in section 102. The report adds in section 104: "Syrian officials have also offered to actively cooperate with and assist the commission by making available information in their possession which may be relevant to the investigation." All of this cements what the Syrians have been saying for the past year. If Brammertz had anything against them he would have said it. At rest, at least for now, fears of the testimony of former vice-president Abdul-Halim Khaddam, who met Brammertz in January and directly implicated the Syrian president in killing Al-Hariri. Gone are accusations brought by Mehlis against senior members of the Baathist regime, and so too are stories of a conspiracy being hatched in Damascus, at the Presidential Palace and the Meridian Hotel. Brammertz declines to name a single Syrian official as either witness or suspect, unlike Mehlis. Nor does Brammertz indulge his private suspicions, again, unlike Mehlis, who said that it was "probable" that an assassination of this nature and significance could not have occurred in Lebanon without the direct involvement of Syrian and Lebanese intelligence. Before leaving his job as head of the UN investigating commission, Mehlis promised that the upcoming months, which we are currently living, would be "Syrian months". From what Brammertz gave us, they truly are, but to the favour of Damascus, not against it.
