Hizbullah Rules Out Arrests in 'Void' U.N. Hariri Case
Hizbullah Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah on Saturday ruled out the arrest of four members of his party indicted by the Special Tribunal for Lebanon for the 2005 assassination of Lebanese former premier Rafik Hariri.
In his first reaction to the charges by the STL, Nasrallah also rejected "each and every void accusation" made by the Netherlands-based court, which he said was heading for a trial in absentia.
"We reject the Special Tribunal for Lebanon along with each and every void accusation it issues, which to us is equivalent to an attack on Hizbullah," Nasrallah said in an hour-long televised speech.
"No Lebanese government will be able to carry out any arrests whether in 30 days, 30 years or even 300 years," said the Shiite leader whose group dominates the current government.
"What will happen is a trial in absentia, a trial in which the verdict has already been reached,” he declared.
The STL on Thursday handed Lebanon's Prosecutor General Saeed Mirza arrest warrants for four members of the Iranian- and Syrian-backed group in connection with the February 14, 2005 bombing that killed Hariri and 22 others in Beirut.
The whereabouts of the four remain unknown.
Nasrallah went on to accuse top investigators at the tribunal, including the first U.N. chief investigator, Detlev Mehlis, and his deputy, Gerhard Lehmann, of corruption.
The tribunal is full of "financial and moral corruption," Nasrallah said.
In elaborately edited segments, al-Manar television aired footage which Nasrallah said showed former Lehmann receiving a wad of cash in exchange for documents in the Hariri case.
Al-Manar also aired a document which Nasrallah said proved investigators had transferred IT equipment across Lebanon's southern border into Israel when it moved its staff to the Netherlands in 2009.
"Do you expect this tribunal to be fair with resistance fighters who fought against Israel?" he said. "This tribunal, since the beginning, was formed for a clear political target."
But Nasrallah sought to allay concerns of civil strife and said "there will be no civil war in Lebanon."
"This is because there is a responsible government in Lebanon that will not act with revenge," he added.
Source: Agence France Presse, Associated Press
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