UN Urges STL Not to Grant Sayyed Access to Investigations!

06/10/2010 Believe it or not…

Believe it or not… The United Nations has the right to interfere in the international tribunal’s work and to give orders to the judges… However, it has also the right to claim the tribunal is “independent” and not politically-motivated…

That’s it… Under-Secretary-General for Legal Affairs Patricia O'Brien can urge the Special Tribunal for Lebanon not to grant Lebanese former General Security Chief Major General Jamil Sayyed access to investigation documents despite a previous verdict, in a flagrant interference in the tribunal’s operational activities…

According to official reports, O'Brien filed a request with Judge Antonio Cassese, President of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, asking him to refrain from granting General Sayyed access to investigation documents. She based her request on “the inviolability of the archives and documents of the United Nations.”

“Any documents or material of the United Nations International Independent Investigation Commission and any other United Nations documents and material on the criminal file are inviolable under the terms of article 11 of the Convention on the Privileges and Immunities of the United Nations,” said O'Brien in her “brief on the inviolability of United Nations documents” addressed to Cassese.

“Inviolability entails that the documents cannot be disclosed to a third party, copied or used, including non-judicial proceedings, without the consent of the United Nations. The inviolability applies to United Nations documents, but also extends to documents 'held' by it, which may include third party documents given to the United Nations on a confidential basis.”

O'Brien noted that the UN has a policy of :maximum cooperation with international criminal tribunals and has developed a practice of disclosing documents on its own volition in certain circumstances in order to facilitate the work of these tribunals.”

“The United Nations respectfully requests that in considering Sayyed's application for access to his criminal file, and in any other proceedings, the Tribunal, Prosecutors and Defense Counsel appearing before it refrain from disclosing, giving access to and tendering any United Nations documents without prior authorization of the United Nations,” O'Brien concluded.

After all this, accusing the tribunal of being politicized is “prohibited”!


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