BEIRUT, 22 November 2005 — Chief UN investigator Detlev Mehlis rejected a proposal from Damascus to use offices in the Golan Heights to question Syrian officials about the killing of an ex-Lebanese prime minister, Lebanese sources said yesterday.
With the clock ticking for Syria to fully cooperate with the inquiry or face further action, Mehlis and Syria were contemplating conducting the interviews in a “neutral country”, the political sources said.
Mehlis, a German prosecutor who heads the UN investigation into the Feb 14. truck bomb assassination of Rafik Hariri in Beirut, had demanded he be allowed to quiz the six military and intelligence officials at his headquarters in Lebanon.
The six military and intelligence officials include a man who is President Bashar Assad’s brother-in-law and the head of Syrian military intelligence, Maj. Gen. Assef Shawkat.
Mehlis’ request came after a unanimous Security Council resolution last month demanded Syria fully cooperate with the investigation or face unspecified action, which could be economic sanctions.
“Mehlis no longer insists on Lebanon as a venue but he has turned down the idea of the Golan,” one political source said. “Ideas are floating around over a neutral country, like Germany, Switzerland or Cyprus, but there is no agreement yet.” UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan called Bashar twice last week in an attempt to find a way out of the impasse.
