BEIRUT: Prime Minister Najib Mikati is accelerating efforts to have the Cabinet decide on the divisive issue of paying Lebanon’s share to a U.N.-backed court ahead of a Dec. 15 deadline, saying that the “time of decision” to act on the court’s funding has come, a source close to Mikati said Sunday.
“The funding of the international tribunal has entered its final stage after Prime Minister Mikati had sent letters to the finance and justice ministers asking them to refer the files of the tribunal’s funding to the Cabinet,” the source told The Daily Star.
According to the source, who refused to be identified because of the sensitivity of the matter, Lebanon has been notified by the Netherlands-based Special Tribunal for Lebanon, which is probing the 2005 assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, that Dec. 15 is the deadline for Lebanon to pay its more than $30 million share to the STL’s annual budget.
“Prime Minister Mikati is working to have the Cabinet decide on this issue [the court’s funding] before this deadline,” the source said.
The source ruled out the inclusion of the STL’s funding on the agenda of this week’s Cabinet session, scheduled for Friday.
On Mikati’s orders, Finance Minister Mohammad Safadi has already sent a letter to Cabinet demanding a loan from the treasury to pay Lebanon’s share of the STL’s funding.
Justice Minister Shakib Qortbawi, asked whether his ministry had taken any measures to speed up the court’s funding, told The Daily Star Sunday night: “The Cabinet will decide on this matter [the court’s funding] when it is presented to it.” Asked whether he thinks the STL’s funding would be easily approved given the split within Cabinet over the issue, Qortbawi, who belongs to the Free Patriotic Movement headed by Michel Aoun, said: “Let’s wait for the Cabinet decision. I don’t like to make prediction.”
Hezbollah and the FPM staunchly oppose the STL altogether, let alone funding it.
Hezbollah’s State Minister for Administrative Reform Mohammad Fneish said the party’s position on the STL’s funding is well-known as has been outlined by Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah. “So far, we have not been informed that the tribunal issue has been referred to the Cabinet,” Fneish told The Daily Star.
STL spokesperson Marten Youssef said although the tribunal has received contributions from nearly 30 countries, Lebanon must still pay its share of 49 percent of the court’s budget.
“We have funding secure until the end of December 2011. We have received contributions from nearly 30 countries, which is a clear indication that we have the support from the international community to carry on with our mandate. This does not mean that Lebanon is still not obliged to contribute 49 per cent of the STL budget,” Youssef told The Daily Star Sunday.
Ministerial sources said the STL’s funding is expected to be a main item on the agenda of the Cabinet session slated to be held on Nov. 30 after Mikati’s return from the Vatican.
According to the sources, among matters that led to haste in efforts to raise the court’s funding is a visit by the STL’s president to Lebanon Wednesday, during which he is expected to discuss with Lebanese officials the payment of Lebanon’s share to the court.
After talks in London with British Prime Minister David Cameron on Nov. 8, Mikati said he would put the divisive issue of the STL’s funding to a vote in the Cabinet, a move that is likely to result in blocking the payment of Lebanon’s share to the court by Hezbollah and its March 8 allies.
Mikati’s remarks came apparently in response to Nasrallah who said last month that his party is against the STL’s funding and called for a vote within the Cabinet if no agreement was reached among the ministers on the contentious issue.
Since Hezbollah and its March 8 allies have a majority in Mikati’s 30-man Cabinet and can block any decision, Nasrallah’s declaration effectively dashes any hope for the government to approve the payment of Lebanon’s share to the STL’s funding.
The STL’s funding is emerging as a major bone of contention within the Cabinet and also between the March 8 and March 14 camps. Mikati is coming under pressure from the opposition March 14 parties and international powers to honor Lebanon’s commitments and U.N. resolutions, including the STL and its funding. The U.S has warned Lebanon it could face “serious consequences” should it fail to fund the STL. Meanwhile, former Prime Minister Saad Hariri said the STL would achieve justice against the killers of his father and perpetrators of other crimes.
“We affirm to martyr Pierre Amin Gemayel that the international tribunal for Lebanon is continuing its work to bring the killers to book, achieve justice and put an end to the organized political crimes, while the region’s peoples are on their way to terminate the era of killings, tyranny and terrorism,” Hariri said in a statement on the fifth anniversary of the assassination of Kataeb (Phalange) Industry Minister Pierre Gemayel.
Hariri said he was confident that justice would prevail against the killers of his father. “Justice will prevail, the tribunal has begun its work and soon we will see the criminals behind bars,” Hariri told his supporters while chatting on the social network Twitter Sunday.
Asked whether Mikati would resign if he was unable to secure funding for the STL, Hariri said the premier would only resign if he felt that Assad would be toppled. “If he resigns, it will be only, AND ONLY, because he feels his boss is about to fall,” he wrote in a tweet.
Asked to comment on Safadi’s asking the government to fund the STL, Hariri said: “Look we all know what Nasrallah said. So playing smart with smart people is not good enough, put the cash in the bank.” – With additional reporting by Hasan Lakkis and Patrick Galey
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