"Conflicts between Bellemarre, Vincent Divided MOU between Lebanon, Tribunal"

The Memorandum of Understanding between Lebanon and the International Tribunal expected to try suspects in the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri seemed to be another source of conflict within the national-unity government.

Indeed, Justice Minister Ibrahim Najjar raised the issue during the cabinet's last meeting and called on the ministers to approve it in order to determine the legal coordination between Lebanon and the tribunal. The ministers asked, however, for a delay in order to study the document and submit their observations, if they found any.

According to Lebanese daily Al-Akhbar, there was a tendency to adopt only one understanding between the tribunal as a unified body and the Lebanese State. But the conflicts that erupted between the general prosecutor Danielle Bellemarre and the tribunal's registrar Robin Vincent over the tribunal's budget and other procedural aspects played the major role in preparing three memorandums instead of only one: the first would be with the general prosecutor's office, the second with the defense office and the third with the registrar's office.

Moreover, the MoU's draft tends to give the international prosecutor absolute legal powers within Lebanon, mainly in the fields of collecting data, moving all over Lebanon, reaching all institutions and places, questioning any political figure regardless of its position and class.

According to legal experts, the understanding is not clear enough in the immunity's issue. Bellemarre and other officials said openly that no one had any immunity but nothing was official in this regard. In the same context, the MoU didn't specify the side that could be given the right to arrest the suspects, which raises the question whether the international judge would arrest anybody at any time or whether the operation would pass through the Lebanese justice.

Well-informed sources also said that the way of raising the issue during the cabinet's last meeting created worries that the MoU might include "something" that some sides would like to "smuggle" in one sense or another.

In this context, Finance Minister Mohamad Shatah said that the ministers had the right to ask for a delay in order to discuss the proposal of the Justice Minister. He stressed that the general principle is approved by all ministers. "Therefore, the problem resides only in some expressions that need to be re-considered," he noted.

For his part, Vice Prime Minister Issam Abu Jamra earlier told Al-Manar that the document needs to be studied deeply. "With all our respect to the Justice Minister, but a project like this should be deeply revised and studied," he explained. For his part,

Justice Minister Ibrahim Najjar said that the MoU was to coordinate between the Lebanese government and General Prosecutor Judge Danielle Bellemare's office. Najjar said the cabinet should give Bellemare guarantees that it would abide by all the tribunal's requests, adding that the cabinet's decision concerning the MoU would be decisive and should not submit to the obstructing third vote.