Britain: Syria must cooperate with UN murder probe
By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
The British government insisted Tuesday that Syria must cooperate with a United Nations inquiry into the murder of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri.
Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said the UN's interim report on the February 14 assassination was a "chilling catalogue of evasion and half truths by the Syrian government."
The UN Security Council unanimously passed a resolution Monday that demanded Syria cooperates fully with UN investigators. The resolution, co-sponsored by the United States, Britain and France, warned that "further measures" were possible if Syria didn't give full assistance to the UN probe headed by German prosecutor Detlev Mehlis.
In an initial report to the Security Council, Mehlis concluded Hariri could not have been killed without the complicity of Syrian and Lebanese intelligence, and accused the Syrian government of co-operating with the investigation only to a "limited degree."
"I hope very much the Syrian government does change its ways and cooperates with the UN prosecutor Detlev Mehlis," said Straw. "There has been a history of, at best, co-operation on form but certainly not on substance."