The Daily Star - More delay expected by STL in light of new material - May 09, 2011

By Patrick Galey

The Daily Star BEIRUT: The naming of accused individuals in the international probe into the death of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri will be delayed for months following the submission of “substantive new material” to the investigation’s pre-trial judge, a court spokesperson said Sunday.Judge Daniel Bellemare, prosecutor of the Netherlands-based Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL), announced over the weekend that additional material had been handed to Pre-Trial Judge Daniel Fransen, replacing the previous indictment issued March 11. “The amendment of an indictment or the filing of new indictments is and will continue to be guided solely by the evidence uncovered by the ongoing investigation,” a statement from Bellemare’s office said. A separate statement said that there was no clear timeframe for Fransen to approve or reject the new material, which is likely to raise questions over the efficacy of a court already beleaguered by accusations of politicization. “This will take months rather than weeks and this doesn’t have a particular time line,” an STL spokesperson told The Daily Star. “It’s in everybody’s interest to expedite this but there are processes that need to be taken into account in order for justice to occur. It needs to be looked at in the perspective of fair process. This is six years of work. It is to the benefit of justice for the pre-trial judge to review [the indictment] as soon as possible and that is exactly what he is doing,” the spokesperson said. Bellemare filed his first indictment back in January while announcing that the period of Fransen’s approval would take at least six to 10 weeks. In March, the prosecutor filed an amended indictment that Friday’s second amendment supersedes. The spokesperson denied that there had been any ulterior motives for the delay caused by Bellemare’s second amended indictment. “The process is confidential. We are taking about independent judges at the highest levels of international justice and there is no room at all for politicization in this,” the spokesperson said. The tribunal has been the center of fierce political debate in Beirut, with its opponents decrying its alleged partisanship. Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah has labeled the STL and Israeli project and threatened to “cut the hand” of whomever targets his party if, as expected, Hezbollah members are named in finalized indictments. The prosecutor’s office made it clear that further amendments and even new ones were not out of the question. “The prosecutor does not intend to make further amendments to the indictment, unless ordered to do so by the pre-trial judge. Other indictments could, however, be filed in the future if warranted by the evidence,” the statement from Bellemare’s office said. The court advised that the all indictments and amendments would remain confidential until publicly confirmed by Fransen, in a process to be completed in “the coming months.” Caretaker Labor Minister Butros Harb said he hoped the altered indictment would not delay the court’s decisions on who was responsible for killing five time premier Hariri. “We were expecting [indictments] to be announced at the end of the month and I hope that this will not delay that,” Harb, a lawyer by qualification, told The Daily Star. “The process is a heavy one. I was not expecting results very soon but I know that they are working seriously and this [amendment] proves that they are taking the job seriously. People here are expecting to see some results soon.”