Daily Star - Hariri stresses Tribunal should not be used for political means - Friday, September 10, 2010

BEIRUT: Prime Minister Saad Hariri on Thursday voiced trust in Lebanon’s capability to challenge looming internal and foreign threats under the current regional circumstances.

Hariri spoke from Saudi Arabia where he was performing the Umrah rituals.

“The Lebanese are capable of surmounting all looming dangers – whether internal or foreign – by holding on to the principles of truth, justice and national coexistence and strengthening their national unity by overlooking narrow tensions and joining hands to face attempts to stir strife,” Hariri said.

Lebanon is expected to witness a flurry of diplomacy following the end of the Eid al-Fitr holiday as media reports said assistant US Secretary of State for Middle Eastern Affairs, Jack Wallace, and French Special Envoy for Lebanese Affairs, Jean Claude Cousseran, are expected to land in Beirut next week.

Their visit comes as part of a tour of the region to follow up on Israeli-Palestinian direct peace negotiations, in which they will hold talks with the Syrian leadership in Damascus in an attempt to revive Syrian-Israeli peace talks.

While Hariri, along with the leadership of the March 14 camp, stresses that the failure of US-sponsored Israeli-Palestinian peace talks would help fuel extremism in the region, Hizbullah and opposition parties have condemned the negotiations as a renouncement of Palestinian rights and sentenced talks to failure.

Media reports said Thursday that the Lebanese scene is expected to witness heated debate over the issue next week as Lebanese parties continue to deliberate over the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) and the issue of false witnesses.

Hizbullah’s Loyalty to Resistance bloc leader MP Mohammad Raad reiterated Thursday the need to put false witnesses on trial while Lebanese Forces MP Antoine Zahra stressed that the issue of “false witnesses was tied to a legal study being prepared by the justice minister.”

“We heard in the last few days stances which we will not rush to comment on until we see how these stances would be made practical,” Raad said in reference to Hariri’s remarks to Saudi pan-Arab daily Ash-Sharq al-Awsat.

Hariri said Monday he made a mistake when he accused Syria of involvement in his father’s murder and condemned false witnesses for misleading probes and “politicizing the murder.”

Minister of State Adnan al-Sayyed Hussein said Thursday that “no dates or time commitments were set for the justice minister to finish the task delegated to him by the Cabinet regarding false witnesses.”

Commenting on the relation between Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea and Hariri, following the premier’s remarks to Asharq al-Awsat, Zahra said no divergence in stances existed between Hariri and Geagea. “What concerns us is Hariri’s continued support to the STL,” Zahra said.

Though he condemned false witnesses, Hariri continued to distance the course of the UN-backed tribunal from political accusations. “I do not want to talk much about the STL but I will only say that the court has its course – one that is not related to previous hasty political accusations,” Hariri told Ash-Sharq al-Awsat, in reference to previous accusations against Damascus.