Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Seniora announced Tuesday night that all documents related to the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafic Hariri were transferred to Hague, where the International Tribunal is located, local Naharnet website reported Wednesday.
"On Monday night, all documents related to the international investigations were flown to Hague" Seniora said in an interview to local Future TV.
An international investigation committee was set after Hariri was assassinated in a car bomb on Feb. 14, 2005.
Seniora added that as for the four detained security generals arrested in a Lebanese jail since the investigation of the murder started, also requires a cabinet endorsement for relocation.
UN chief investigator Daniel Bellemare told An-Nahar daily that starting from March the 1st, the situation will change as he will take over the investigation from the Lebanese public prosecutor, and can ask for the transfer of everything related to the investigation, including those in custody (four generals).
Asked if he expects the Lebanese government to delay or prevent the transfer of the four generals, Bellemare said he has no reason to believe that the Lebanese authorities would refuse his request.
He added that there is "a chance the four generals might request that the tribunal look into their situation."
The four security generals are former General Security chief Jamil Sayyed, former Internal Security Forces chief Ali Haj, former Lebanese army intelligence chief Rymond Azar, and former presidential guards chief Moustafa Hamdan. They were arrested following the testimony of a Syrian witness Zouhair Saddiek who said that the four generals were involved in planning Hariri's assassination.
Meanwhile, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said in New York that the Tribunal which will start in March will help reinforce political stability in Lebanon, and send a "strong message to the world that such crimes will not go unpunished."
The Lebanese opposition, mainly Hezbollah, however, believe that the arrest of the four generals was a political pressure imposed on Syria, since the four generals were cooperating with the Syrian security during the Syrian political and military presence in the country.
Syria, also accused by the majority in Lebanon of involvement in the assassination of Hariri, pulled out its troops from Lebanon in June 2005 following the assassination of Hariri in the same year, and after 29 years of presence in the small neighboring country.
(Xinhua News Agency February 11, 2009)