Annan seeks alternative site for Hariri interviews

By Mark Turner 
November 16, 2005
Financial Times
Original Source: http://news.ft.com/cms/s/d03b05a0-56e9-11da-b98c-00000e25118c.html

Kofi Annan, the UN secretary-general, has become directly involved in efforts to find an alternative site where international investigators could interview Syrian officials over the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri.
Detlev Mehlis, the UN investigator, is said to want to interview six officials in Beirut, but Damascus has rejected the proposal, warning that holding them there could stir destabilising “emotions and sensitivities”.
Officials said Mr Annan was keen to find a compromise, which might avoid Mr Mehlis, the German prosecutor, reporting Syria’s non-co-operation to the UN Security Council. That report could set in train action, including sanctions, under the UN’s chapter 7 enforcement mechanisms.
In a letter this week to Tony Blair, the UK prime minister, Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian president, noted that the legal adviser to Syria’s Foreign Ministry had met Mr Mehlis last Wednesday in Beirut.
He “proposed to him holding his investigations in any place he chose in Syria, which could be put at the disposal of the United Nations and raise its flag, or at UNDOF headquarters,” the letter said, referring to the UN mission in the Golan Heights.
He also said the investigations could be held at the Arab League headquarters in Cairo, but, the letter said, “Mr Mehlis rejected the proposals hinting that he would go back to the Security Council to claim that Syria did not co-operate with [the investigative committee].”
The letter appealed for Mr Blair’s support to use the “headquarters of the UN forces in the Golan, which is under full control of the United Nations”, which would “assure the international community that Syria is keen on uncovering the truth.”
One source close to the UN said other Security Council members had also received the letter. The same source suggested that if the interviews were not to be held in Lebanon, the most likely compromise would be for them to be held in Europe, possibly in UN facilities in Geneva or Vienna.