U.N. Tribunal Created for Hariri Case

May 31, 07:58 AM

Current Headlines: The U.N. Security Council voted to move ahead with the trial of the suspected killers of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

The special tribunal to deal with Hariri's suspected killers will be formally established June 10 under a Security Council vote Wednesday.

Hariri and 22 other people died in a suicide car bombing in Beirut in February 2005. The Security Council said the tribunal will have an international character.

The resolution establishing after Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora sent a letter to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon earlier this month, a U.N. news release said.

Ban told Security Council members in a subsequent letter that he agreed with Siniora that regrettably, all domestic options for the ratification of the Special Tribunal now appear to be exhausted, although it would have been preferable had the Lebanese parties been able to resolve the issue among themselves based on a national consensus.

In April 2005, a U.N. mission found that Lebanon's inquiry into the Hariri assassination was flawed and that Syria was primarily responsible for political tensions that preceded the attack, the U.N. news release said.