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Syria refutes U.N. Hariri report
(CNN) -- Syria's foreign minister has said his country was an easy target for U.N. investigators examining who was behind the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.
Speaking at a news conference Saturday to refute a U.N. report on Hariri's killing, Foreign Minister Farouk al-Shara said just because Syria had a strong military presence in Lebanon did not mean it was involved in the former prime minister's assassination.
"There's a presumption taken by the (U.N.) commission that the very presence of Syrian troops and the Syrian security organs in Lebanon is something which should imply so and so and so," said al-Shara, speaking in English.
"You cannot put any weight on the idea (that) because you are present in Lebanon, everything happening in Lebanon ... should be done according to your knowledge and you know about it," al-Shara said.
"The report has a conclusion that this operation, the assassination of late Prime Minister Hariri, cannot be done without a means, a very sophisticated means which belongs to a highly-equipped security organ. And you just look around you, who is very very well equipped?" al-Shara said.
The U.N. report concluded there was "converging evidence" of Lebanese and Syrian involvement in Hariri's February 14 assassination. (Full story)
The report's author, German prosecutor Detlev Mehlis, would not say if the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad was cooperative during the investigation, telling a Friday news conference: "That's something we should leave for later."
Also Saturday, a Syrian Foreign Ministry official denied that Damascus failed to cooperate in the U.N. investigation and said it might allow U.N. investigators to quiz Syrian officials.
"Everything that was mentioned in the report with regard to Syria's noncooperation is baseless," Riad al-Daoudi told a packed news conference in Damascus.
"We cooperated but this cooperation was misunderstood. I hope that (misunderstanding) was not intentional," he said.
Asked whether Syria would allow further questioning of officials, al-Daoudi said, "If there is any demand coming from the commission we will discuss it with the commission and we might agree."
"We will cooperate but we'll see what are the boundaries of this cooperation and its elements," he said.
Al-Daoudi repeated Syrian denials of involvement in Hariri's killing and said the report's findings were politicized and aimed at targeting Syria rather than finding the truth.
"All that was contained in the report is based on presumptions and allegations ... . There's no proof," he said.
"The (U.N.) committee until now has not provided any worthy evidence ... but rather has opened the door to debate on points it still is trying to prove," he said. "This report could not be used in court."
Hariri's assassination sparked a wave of protests in Beirut that helped lead to Syria's announced withdrawal from the country in April.
Saad Hariri -- Rafik Hariri's son and a Lebanese parliament member -- on Saturday said he agreed with many of the U.N. report's findings and called for an international court to exact justice on the assassins. (Full story)
