MIDDLE EAST: A Lebanese prosecutor charged four pro-Syrian generals yesterday with murder for the killing of former prime minister Rafik al-Hariri, judicial sources said.
They said judge Saeed Meerza had charged the four men, detained on Tuesday on the orders of chief UN investigator Detlev Mehlis, with murder, attempted murder and carrying out a terrorist act in the February killing of Mr Hariri and 20 others.
The charges came hours after Mr Mehlis said he had recommended to Lebanon that the four be formally arrested on suspicion of planning the bombing. He said he believed there were more people involved but that there were no Syrian suspects so far.
Lebanese police had detained Maj Gen Jamil al-Sayyed, former head of general security; Maj GeAli Hajj, ex-chief of police; and Brig Gen Raymond Azar, former military intelligence chief, in dawn raids on Tuesday at the request of UN investigators.
Brig Gen Mustafa Hamdan, the head of Lebanon's Republican Guard, handed himself over to the UN team the same day.
Gen Hamdan, a close aide of pro-Syrian president Emile Lahoud, was the only security chief to keep his job after parliamentary elections ending in June ushered in an anti-Syrian majority for the first time since the end of Lebanon's 1975-1990 civil war.
The UN Security Council ordered the probe after a fact-finding mission found Lebanon incapable of carrying out a credible investigation into the attack that hastened the departure of Syrian troops from the country after three decades. - (Reuters)