The successor of Judge Mehlis notably tones down the politics of the Al-Hariri assassination, exonerating Syria for its cooperation with the UN investigation, writes Sami Moubayed The new UN report in the assassination of Lebanon's former Prime Minister Rafik Al-Hariri was received with mixed emotions in Syria and Lebanon. The Syrian government, which has been holding its breath in anticipation, warmly embraced it, saying that it was fair and professional. The report was feared in Damascus, after all, because it included the testimony of former Syrian Vice-President Abdul- Halim Khaddam, who defected from the regime in December 2005, pledging to bring it down and meet the UN investigating commission in January 2006. His testimony, however -- from what has been revealed so far -- has not brought about the direct condemnation of the Syrian regime, as Khaddam so wished. Anti-Syrian statesmen in Lebanon, however, were more reluctant to shower the report with praise, preferring to wait for the final issue, which is due mid-June 2006. The new Belgian prosecutor Serge Brammertz authored a technical report that steered clear from politics, unlike the case of his predecessor Detlev Mehlis. German prosecutor Mehlis had presented two highly dramatic reports, in October and December 2005 respectively, sending shockwaves throughout Syria and Lebanon. Among other things, Mehlis had explicitly said that the decision to kill Al-Hariri had been taken in Damascus, at the Presidential Palace. Mehlis said that a Syrian officer had told an unnamed witness that Al-Hariri was a problem for Syria, and that an "earthquake" in Lebanon would re-write its history. The Mitsubishi van, Mehlis said, used to carry out the attack against Al-Hariri on 14 February was seen in the summer resort of Zabadani, near Damascus, being loaded with explosives in the presence of Ahmed Abu Addas, a man who appeared on a pre-recorded tape hours after the murder, claiming responsibility for Al-Hariri's assassination. Abu Addas, Mehlis had said, was forced to record his testimony at gunpoint, threatened by Syria's intelligence chief Assef Shawkat. Mehlis also devoted a part of his report to documenting an allegedly stormy meeting between President Bashar Al-Assad and Prime Minister Al-Hariri held in Damascus in August 2004. Mehlis depicted those who supported the story that Assad had threatened Al-Hariri as having told the truth, those who questioned the allegation -- including Farouk Al-Shara and Walid Al-Moualim -- as liars. All of these details, which added high drama to the Hariri affair, do not appear up in the Brammertz report. Rather, and a shock to all those who contributed to the findings of Mehlis, Brammertz states that "a decision has been taken to discontinue some of the previous lines of inquiry." The fact that Brammertz makes no reference to the aforementioned elements of the Mehlis report suggests that the investigating commission has dropped these allegations, presumably for lack of evidence. Had they been proven they almost certainly would have been included in the report of Brammertz. Indeed, Brammertz, while he does concentrate on Syria and its cooperation with the commission, declines to speculate on the political context of the Hariri murder. Nor does Brammertz name a single Syrian official as either witness or suspect -- unlike Mehlis, who named Shawkat and others in an initial draft, later omitted, including Rustom Ghazaleh, director of Syrian intelligence in Lebanon, Bahjat Sulayman, former director of internal security in Syria, and Maher Al-Assad, brother of President Assad. The fact that this list does not show up in the Brammertz report adds further question marks on the seriousness of Mehlis's findings. Brammertz does not incriminate anybody in his report, and does not give the slightest hint on what his own suspicions are -- 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. The counter-argument surfacing with those wishing Brammertz to incriminate Syria is that while Brammertz does not implicate Syrian officials, he does not explicitly deny their involvement, leaving room for speculation. Other points in the Brammertz report say that the commission "has moved closer to establishing a unifying theory of the exact circumstances of the blast that killed Mr Hariri." Brammertz clearly says, however, that further forensic studies of the crime scene need to be made, as well as examination of the damaged vehicles. He adds, "It is likely that fragments from relevant vehicles are still at the crime scene" and that they need to be examined. Brammertz shows that an exact time for the blast has not been identified, with two theories in play -- one saying it took place at 12:56:26 and the other at 12:55:05. The time difference of one minute and 21 seconds, and its reasons, also need to be investigated. So do the packaging, DNA and fingerprints of the videotape of Ahmad Abu Addas that was sent to Al-Jazeera's office in Beirut. Also, there is no consensus on whether the blast took place underground, over-ground, or a combination of both, although Brammertz says that he "prioritised" the "evaluation of possible road works occurring in the vicinity of the explosion". Brammertz also needs more time, he says, to investigate testimonies about the Mitsubishi van that was seen in Syria, and further study footage of the crime scene captured by the HSBS surveillance cameras. More investigation is also needed to know why Al-Hariri's motorcade was delayed on the day of the bombing, and why orders emerged from the Internal Security Forces (ISF) to place Al-Hariri under surveillance. More investigation is needed to reveal if the scandal of Al-Madina Bank, which Al-Hariri promised to tackle, is related to the decision to eliminate him. All of these questions bring about an immediate thought: what exactly was Mehlis doing since February 2005? If he does not know who ordered the crime, when the crime took place, how it took place, whom were the people on the scene of the crime, and what were their motives, what does he know? Was his report just a combination of testimonies, gathered from anti-Syrian statesmen in Lebanon, to incriminate the Syrian regime? Was Mehlis being manipulated by forces in Syria and Lebanon? Most pleasing to the Syrian regime is Section 93 of the Brammertz report, which says: "Syria has signalled its intention to fully comply with these resolutions [UN Security Council Resolutions 1595 and 1636]." In Section 95, Brammertz says that the Syrian officials requested for interviews made themselves available to the commission, and that the UN team "was informed on 9 March 2006 that a meeting with the president (Assad) and another meeting with the vice-president (Farouk Al-Shara) will take place in the upcoming month". This had been an issue of concern since January 2006, when the commission requested to meet the Syrian president. Syria has also promised to arrest, or make fully available to the commission, any person involved in the Hariri affair, with Brammertz saying: "Syria has signalled that it will fully comply with any such requests, including by arresting and making available to the commission the person concerned." Brammertz adds that Syria has "formally complied with nearly all of the commission's previous requests for assistance." It had let the commission examine the archives of Military Intelligence and reviewed records related to the political situation in Lebanon, for example. These archives, Mehlis said, had been burned. Syria is very clearly pleased with the Brammertz report. It proves that for now it has cooperated with the UN commission and that the storm heading towards Damascus since February 2005 has been delayed. More investigations are to follow, with the final outcome of the entire Hariri ordeal not made public until June 2006.
