As reports predict the politicized verdict in the assassination of Lebanese former Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri would be announced very soon, more scandals about the investigations are uncovered day after another…
FINGERPRINTS OF 4 MILLION LEBANESE
In the newest report in this context, Lebanese daily As-Safir revealed on Thursday that the Special Tribunal for Lebanon’s Prosecutor Daniel Bellemare has asked the interior ministry to provide him with the fingerprints of 4 million Lebanese.
The daily said that after reviewing laws, the ministry provided Prosecutor Daniel Bellemare with only several hundred fingerprints.
FOUR MINISTERS CONCERNED
The report came a day after it was revealed that caretaker Ministers Ghazi Aridi (Public Affairs), Gebran Bassil (Energy), Ziad Baroud (Interior) and Charbel Nahhas (Telecommunications) had turned down requests from Bellemare to provide information and documents, despite calls by the head of the caretaker government Saad Hariri to “cooperate” with the tribunal.
Nahhas confirmed on Wednesday that he did not comply with Bellemare's request for information "until the legal debate over the STL is settled at cabinet."
For his part, Aridi said that he "would speak at the appropriate time and unveil what Daniel Bellemare had requested from" the public works ministry.
WHO PUTS LEBANON IN DANGER?
The four ministers were “slammed” by the so-called March 14 forces on Wednesday for turning down STL requests. “If Ministers Aridi, Bassil, Baroud and Nahhas remain adamant in not cooperating with Prosecutor Daniel Bellemare, they and their party backers would have to confront the Lebanese public which is calling for holding accountable ex-Premier Rafiq Hariri's assassins,” the March 14 general-secretariat claimed following its weekly meeting. Their "behavior" would also "put Lebanon in a dangerous confrontation with the international community," the statement said.
WOULD INDICTMENT PRECEDE CABINET?
Meanwhile, Lebanese daily An-Nahar quoted informed sources as saying that developments at the STL were making more progress than the cabinet formation process, hinting to the possibility that Premier-designate Najib Miqati would form the government until after the release of the indictment.
The sources said that Bellemare transferred the indictment under seal to Pre-Trial Judge Daniel Fransen more than six weeks ago, hinting that it would be released in the coming weeks.
River to Sea
Uprooted Palestinian
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