Beirut 30/10/2010
What Were They Thinking?
U.S. Department of State, 2201 C Street NW Washington, DC |
Surely the STL delegation knew, or should have known, that given the predictable ethical, culture, social, legal, humanitarian, political, and security aspects involved, even the very idea itself, should have been thought through.
- What exactly were they looking for?
- Did they carry a valid Lebanese judicial subpoena clearly indentifying the information they were seeking: If so were they based on common jurisprudential underpinnings of probable cause?
- Were valid search warrants served on each of the patients as well as Dr. Charara?
- Who in the Lebanese government gave permission for the visit that appeared to be an end run around local municipal authorities, not to mention Lebanese law?
- Which of the countries of the STL’s investigators, lawyers and judges, including Bellemare’s Canada, would allow such an invasion of privacy?
- If they were targeting husbands of Dr. Charara’s patients what about relevant principles of spousal immunity?
- What was the rational of the Lebanese Order of Physicians if they affixed their imprimatur to the scheme and what is now left of medical privacy laws in Lebanon? Showing up and demanding the names and files of Dr. Charara patients without the permission of the women concerned is clearly outrageous and unacceptable in Lebanon and in most countries.
- On whose administrative or judicial orders did the relevant Lebanese government Ministries appear to allow a shotgun, over broad, fishing expedition approach not jurisprudentially acceptable in any of the countries comprising the STL, or for that matter by the provisions of UNSCR 1757, as well as local laws incorporated by reference? Of course the same questions apply to the reported throwing fishing nets over student, DNA, telecoms, social security, and other records in Lebanon to gather information for the STL.
In Muslim countries, and increasingly in the West, most women prefer women gynecologists and would not condone foreign men perhaps pruriently flipping through intimate medical information looking for “evidence.” It is unacceptable as a matter of family honor to examine the personal medical information of wives, sisters, mothers and daughters as Hezbollah’s Secretary General stated following the melee and rejection by the local community. Most people would agree.
Member of Parliament Walid Jumblatt condemned "the unethical behavior of UN investigators," noting that he understands Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah's political and moral objections against such an act.
The STL so far is silent on its investigative methodology including details such as which court issued the order and indentified which patients were to have their records examined and what probable cause standard was used in each affidavit, if there even were any, that underpinned the STL request.
The suspicion is that against the backdrop of so many Mossad networks being dismantled recently, Israeli intelligence has been able to gather information through the UN created STL even while Bellemare’s office are reportedly unwilling to even consider Israel’s involvement knowing well that Israel is the sole beneficiary of the assassination.
Israeli Army Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkinazi has said that the STL indictment will implicate Hezbollah in the Hariri assassination.
His remarks had also popped up in the German Der Spiegel magazine as well as France’s Le Figaro and Kuwait’s Assiyassa newspapers. Even the French Ambassador to Lebanon Denis Pietton’s slip that “it’s not the end of the world if members of Hezbollah, not the party, were accused” was solid evidence that the STL indictment has been already set down in writing.
It is also the recent backdrop to the bizarre events of 10/17/10 in Dr. Charara’s clinic that should also be born in mind. US Officials have increasingly been repeating their manta: “We Are All the Way with the STL Even if This Leads to Lebanon’s Instability.”
Stability in Lebanon is a primary goal of the Lebanese people and Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkey and Iran.
What Washington and Tel Aviv fear most in the region, a Syria-Saudi-Iranian-Turkey rapprochement, was observed this week between the Saudi Ambassador to Lebanon Ali Awadh Assiri and the Iranian Ambassador to Lebanon Ghazanfar Rokn-Abadi at the celebration of Turkey's Independence.
Fetlman presumably was not amused and advised the White House to demand an emergency session of the UN Security Council to counter what he sees as “pernicious developments pertaining to the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL)”.
The US Undersecretary of States’ ‘really great plan’ to sucker Lebanon and Hezbollah:
“Let’s blame (Imad) Mughniyah for killing Hariri. He’s dead so the investigative trail ends. Just say, ‘We had no idea what he was doing’. No more tribunal. Everyone is happy. And as a sweetener we’ll take Hezbollah off our Terrorism list” is in tatters.
So is the confidence of many that the International Tribunal for Lebanon seeks to bring to justice the assassins of Rafiq Hariri?
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