(Washington Post) Colum Lynch - A Lebanese police officer and UN investigators unearthed extensive circumstantial evidence implicating the Syrian-backed Hizbullah movement in the February 2005 assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri, according to an investigation by the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. The UN Investigation Commission's findings are based on Lebanese phone records that suggest Hizbullah officials communicated with the owners of cell phones used to coordinate the detonation that killed Hariri and 22 others as they traveled through downtown Beirut. A Lebanese officer, Col. Wissam Eid, reviewed the call records of all cellphones used in the vicinity of the Hotel St. George, where Hariri's convoy was bombed. He quickly established a network of "red" phones that had been used by the hit squad. He then established links with other small phone networks which he traced back to a landline at Hizbullah's Great Prophet Hospital in south Beirut, and a handful of government-issued cell phones set aside for Hizbullah. Eid was killed in a car bomb eight days after being contacted by a team of British investigators working for the UN.
2010-11-22 08:07:33Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive