The United Nations signed Tuesday an agreement setting up an international tribunal to try suspects in the 2005 assassination of ex-Premier Rafik Hariri. The documents have been ratified by Premier Fouad Saniora's majority government, but were never referred to parliament for final ratification because President Emile Lahoud and House Speaker Nabih Berri consider the cabinet illegal after resignation of six ministers. "We hope that the Lebanese government will take the necessary measures to able to ratify this process, in accordance with their constitutional requirement," U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon reiterated Tuesday.
According to U.N. spokeswoman Michele Montas, the accord was signed by the director-general of the Ministry of Justice on behalf of the Lebanese Republic - not by Saniora.
Lahoud said Tuesday that the prime minister violated the constitution by sending to the United Nations the approval. The pro-Syrian president said the contents of Saniora's letter were "misleading and sidestepped reality and the rules of the constitution, conventions and national unity." "The purpose of (Saniora's message) is to generate confusion and suspicion and to create an atmosphere for the Security Council to take over the subject and establish the tribunal," he said, according to the AP.
Saniora reacted in a statement issued by his office later Tuesday, accusing the president of "harming Lebanon's image as an independent state" and acting under outside orders to block the international tribunal. In his statement, Saniora reiterated his position that the government is constitutional as long as it enjoyed a parliamentary majority.
