STL: Over 60 Victims Applied to Participate in Hariri Case before Tribunal

إقرأ هذا الخبر بالعربية W460

More than 60 people have applied to participate as victims before the STL in the case of Ayyash et al., announced the Special Tribunal for Lebanon in a statement.

“A deadline for their applications had been set by Pre-Trial Judge Daniel Fransen on 8 September and expired on October 31,” it added.

“The applicants are members of various Lebanese communities and include persons who suffered different kinds of harm as a result of the February 14, 2005” assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, it continued.

These and other victims have been met by the STL's Victims' Participation Unit, which has a mandate to inform victims about their rights before the tribunal, and to help them apply for participation if they wish to do so, the statement explained.

The victims' applications will now be translated and then provided to Fransen, who will decide on each individual application for participation and issue a decision in due course.

This process might be expected to take up to several months, it added.

“According to the pre-trial judge’s order, victims who did not apply by the deadline might still be permitted to participate if they can show valid reasons in order to justify the late submission of their application,” it concluded.

Salim Ayyash, Mustafa Badreddine, Hussein Oneissi, and Assad Sabra are wanted for the February 2005 suicide car bomb attack in Beirut that killed Hariri and 22 others, including the suicide bomber.

Ayyash has been named in the indictment as coordinator of the assassination team.

The court on August 17 unsealed the indictment against the four suspects and has said Lebanon must try harder to apprehend them.

Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah has said he doubted the four indictees will ever be found and has branded the tribunal a U.S.-Israeli conspiracy aimed at bringing down the party.

He also ruled out that Hizbullah will support the funding of the STL, stating that if the cabinet failed to reach consensus on the matter, then it should be submitted to vote at the parliament.

Ayyash and Badreddine face five charges including that of "committing a terrorist act by means of an explosive device" and homicide, while Oneissi and Sabra faced charges of conspiring to commit the same acts.

Comments 2
Missing future_vision 01 November 2011, 14:38

no these 60 victims are not lebanese ! they are pro israeliens americans that want to destroy the blessed resistance of lebanon!

u r going to Down hassoun if u like or not ! depends on u if u want to set fire to the country before going down or u will admit that u executed the order coming from syria, give back ur weapons to the lebanese state, ur 4 saints will go to prison and the party members who were trained to fight can just join the lebanese military .. all land lines that u posses must be destroyed and given back to the states.. ur secret tunnels .. everything that does not fall under the state control must fall .. BUT of course all that is a dream ..

u will martyr your party and the country one last time, bring us back to war and say it is for the good cause! basta

Default-user-icon Ravitay (Guest) 01 November 2011, 16:54

And what about the 2 million victims of Rafic Syria's, Syria's best Rafic's filth that spread over 15 years? His barbecuing is not enough justice for them. NOT ENOUGH.