CYPRUS/LEBANON: Cyprus is considering a UN proposal to host an international tribunal to try suspects for the murder of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri.
Last month the UN Security Council directed secretary general Kofi Annan to reach an agreement with Lebanon on setting up the tribunal and organise funding.
A request for such a tribunal was put to the council last December by Lebanese prime minister Fuad Siniora. He said the tribunal should have Lebanese and international judges and meet outside Lebanon because of security concerns.
Mr Siniora also asked for the tribunal to try suspects in the 15 bombings that have shaken the country since the contested extension of the term of president Émile Lahoud, an ally of Syria.
The first bombing took place in October 2004, injuring Marwan Hamadeh, then minister of economy; the second killed Mr Hariri and 22 others in February 2005; the latest, last December, killed Ghassan Tueni, deputy and prominent publisher.
Although the bombings are believed to be linked, it is not clear if Mr Annan has proposed that the mandate of the tribunal be extended to deal with all of them.
Three top-ranking Lebanese security officers have been detained since June for masterminding Mr Hariri's murder, and Lebanese politicians have accused Gen Rustum Ghazali, Syria's former intelligence chief in Lebanon, of involvement.
Last week Serge Brammertz, head of the UN commission investigating the bombings, interviewed Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, who has rejected allegations that he ordered or condoned the murder of Mr Hariri.
Cyprus is seen as a suitable venue because it is near the Middle Eastern mainland and has good relations with both Lebanon and Syria. Cyprus has been free of regional violence since a failed attack on the Israeli embassy in the late 1980s.
Lebanese daily Al-Safir estimates the cost of holding protracted legal proceedings on Cyprus would be $162 million, which could rise to $315 million if held in other European countries.
Having hosted Palestinian-Israeli meetings and provided a base for UN weapons inspectors operating in Iraq ahead of the 2003 war, Cyprus gained a role as a peacemaker in the region.