Hale Says Source of Lebanon Divisions is Violence that STL is Confronting

The political violence that the Special Tribunal for Lebanon is confronting is the source of sharp divisions among the Lebanese, U.S. Ambassador to Beirut David Hale has said.

“I don't think that the Tribunal caused the divisions in Lebanon,” he told pan-Arab daily al-Hayat published on Sunday.

He said the axis of political violence that the court is confronting now is the source of the divisions.

The diplomat rejected attempts to take advantage of assassinations, bombings and violence to terrorise rival politicians.

The victims resorted to the international community to ask for justice rather than resorting to violence, he said.

Asked about reports that the U.S. had not cooperated with the investigators on the mobile phones data, Hale said he should not make comments that would hint any interference in the trial but stressed that Washington has always supported all of the Tribunal's aspects.

Nearly nine years after a suicide truck bomb killed ex-Premier Rafik Hariri and 21 others, the trial started Thursday in The Hague for four Hizbullah suspects accused of plotting the assassination.

The four suspects are Mustafa Badreddine, Salim Ayyash, Assad Sabra and Hassan Oneissi.

A fifth was Hassan Habib Merhi, who was indicted later than the other four suspects and is not currently being tried.

All five of them are not in custody. Lebanese authorities have failed to arrest them.

The STL prosecution's case is made up of evidence including large amounts of data from mobile phones allegedly used by the plotters to plan and execute the bombing.

The U.S. call for stability in Lebanon needs law enforcement and the Tribunal is participating in this process to a big extent, Hale said.

He denied that Washington would reach a settlement on the court if dialogue between the U.S. and Hizbullah-backer Iran made further progress after the nuclear deal that Tehran struck with the West.

Hale said it was in the interest of the Lebanese people to stick to the dissociation policy. But unfortunately Hizbullah is trying to drag the country into the Syrian conflict.

Hizbullah has sent its members to fight alongside Syrian President Bashar Assad's troops despite the Baabda Declaration, which was adopted in 2012 by the rival parties, including Hizbullah, to distance Lebanon from the region's turmoil.

Asked about the formation of the new government in Lebanon, Hale stressed that the process should be held without any foreign interference.

He shied away from answering on whether the international community backed the extension of President Michel Suleiman's term, which expires in May.

He said the U.S. “strongly backed” efforts to choose a Lebanese president.

“Lebanon is no longer occupied by a foreign force,” he said in reference to the withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon in the aftermath of Hariri's assassination in 2005.