Syria OKs Questioning of Officials
DAMASCUS, Syria — Syria has agreed to allow its officials to be questioned at U.N. offices in Vienna by investigators looking into the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, a top diplomat said Friday.
Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Walid Moallem said at a news conference that Syria had received “guarantees concerning the rights of the individuals” targeted for questioning and reassurances that its sovereignty would be respected.
Moallem refused to identify the officials. He said they would be accompanied to Vienna by their lawyers. German prosecutor Detlev Mehlis, head of the investigative commission, has not publicly said whom the commission wants to interview.
Reports have said Mehlis wanted to interview six officials, including the chief of Syria’s military intelligence, Gen. Asef Shawkat, brother-in-law of Syrian President Bashar Assad.
But Moallem said only five were needed for questioning.
“I don’t know where you got the sixth name,” he said.
Hariri was killed with 22 other people in a massive truck bombing Feb. 14 in Beirut. The U.N. commission issued an interim report last month that implicated Syrian and Lebanese intelligence services in the assassination.
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