Syria rejects UN Hariri accusations

Syria on Friday rejected UN findings that linked Damascus to the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri as false, unprofessional and politicized.

Lebanon's president, vowing not to leave office, denied a UN claim that he received a phone call minutes before the killing.

"I think the report is far from professional and will not lead us to the truth," Mehdi Dakhlallah, the Syrian information minister, said in an interview on Al-Jazeera television from the Syrian capital.

He said the report, about which he had seen media reports but did not have an official text, was "100 per cent politicized" and "contained false accusations."

The report of the UN probe, submitted to the UN Security Council late Thursday, implicated top Syrian and Lebanese intelligence officials in the February 14 assassination of Hariri in massive bombing in Beirut that also killed 20 others.

The report also raised questions about Lebanon's pro-Syrian president, Emile Lahoud, who it said received a phone call minutes before the blast from the brother of a prominent member of a pro-Syrian group, who also called one of the four Lebanese generals, Raymond Azar, who have been arrested in the probe.

Lahoud's office "categorically denies" the media reports about Lahoud receiving a phone call, saying "there is no truth to it."

The statement said the accusation is part of continued campaigns against the president and the office "and the national responsibilities he shoulders and will continue to do so at this delicate stage in Lebanon's history."

Since the arrest of four Lebanese generals in August as suspects, anti-Syrian groups have focused on Lahoud, demanding his resignation. Lahoud has refused to step down, saying his hands are clean and that he supports punishing those found guilty of killing Hariri.

Dakhlallah, the Syrian minister, said the investigation led by Detlev Mehlis was biased against Syria and his report was "part of a pressure campaign against Syria which does not stop at accusing Syria of anything evil that happens in the world."

This report "is contrary to the most essential conditions and methods of investigation," he said.

Source: China Daily