By Patrick Galey

BEIRUT: The U.N.-backed court probing the 2005 assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri said Wednesday that Lebanon’s obligation to assist the tribunal in apprehending suspects still stands, a day after Lebanese authorities revealed their search for accused individuals had proved fruitless.

Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) spokesperson Marten Youssef said that the submission of the report, which came two days before the expiry of a court-imposed 30-day deadline on arresting suspects, did not mean Lebanon had fulfilled its duty in cooperating with the investigation.
“Lebanon’s obligation does not end by the mere submission of the report. This is ongoing to search, apprehend and transfer the accused,” Youssef told The Daily Star.

He added that the report by Lebanese authorities had not yet been seen received officially by The Hague.
“The representative of the Tribunal received the report from Prosecutor General [Saeed Mirza] yesterday. I understand it is on its way to The Hague to be filed officially. At this time, it is confidential, but [STL] President [Antonio Cassese] will obviously study it,” Youssef said.

Lebanon filed the report Tuesday informing the STL that the four individuals named in its first indictment, filed at the end of June, had not been apprehended. The suspects are known to have links to Hezbollah, which in turn has vowed that investigators would not arrest party members “even in 300 years.”

Under the court’s statute – enforced by Resolution 1757, which Lebanon signed with the U.N. Security Council in 2007, stipulating Beirut assist the tribunal – authorities have 30 days to apprehend suspects following the release of indictments. That deadline expires Thursday.

Pre-Trial Judge Daniel Fransen had already made some of the indictment contents public, publishing full names and images of the four accused men. Although it is believed that they are the only suspects to appear in the document, some information contained within the indictment has not yet been publicized.

Cassese now has two options: He can either request for additional time from the Lebanese authorities in order to continue the search for the accused, or issue what is known as a “public advertisement,” in which the court goes public with information on suspects. Such a move would produce a new 30-day limit for apprehension of the accused, and is designed to speed up their arrests, as well as alert them to the need of defense counsel.
Although the names of accused individuals – Mustafa Amine Badreddine, Salim Jamil Ayyash, Hussein Hassan Oneissi and Assad Hassan Sabra – are known, that does not mean a public advertisement has already occurred, Youssef said.

“It’s a procedural matter to ensure that the accused know that there are allegations,” he said.
Interior Minister Marwan Charbel said that raids had been carried out on properties in south Beirut and the Bekaa Valley in search of the four Hezbollah members, although no arrests had been made.

Youssef indicated that Cassese would make his decision based on Lebanon’s report “in the coming days,” adding that the president’s chosen course of action would be made public.
Judicial sources have suggested that the four individuals are also thought to have been involved with other killings that occurred during Lebanon’s wave of political assassinations during the previous decade.