The Discerning Texan
All that is necessary for evil to triumph, is for good men to do nothing.
-- Edmund Burke
-- Edmund Burke
Tuesday, December 13, 2005
Syrian Government-sanctioned murder returns to Lebanon
Just as UN investigators have determined beyond a reasonable doubt that the Syrian government assasinated former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri, it seems that the outlaw regime has decided it doesn't much like journalists in Lebanon that criticize Syria either (from Michael Totten in Tech Central Station):
Yesterday, after a quiet spell that lasted almost three months, the terrifying wave of car bomb assassinations against anti-Syrian journalists and political figures started up again in Lebanon. This time the target was Gebran Tueni, the editor-in-chief of An Nahar newspaper and a recently elected member of parliament. Three people were killed and at least thirty people were wounded when his car exploded in the town of Mekalis in the mountains above Beirut.
Tueni had only just arrived in Lebanon from France the day before after hiding out from assassins. He knew the death squads were still active and had him on their hit list. Perhaps, like many who live in Beirut, he thought the danger had passed when clearly it hadn’t.
Mere hours later UN Special Prosecutor Detlev Mehlis released his second report in his investigation into the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. The new report claims that Syrian officials burned “all the Syrian intelligence documents concerning Lebanon.” Tueni was one of many witnesses interviewed by Mehlis in the investigation.
Gebran Tueni was a journalist, but he was not a reporter. He was both an editor and an editorial writer. Perhaps more than anyone else writing in Arabic inside Lebanon, he fiercely demanded freedom and democracy not only for Lebanese citizens but for Syrian citizens, too. The Cedar Revolution that ousted Syrian troops from the country earlier this year counted him as a hero.
The Lebanese Cabinet decided to ask the United Nations to create an international court both inside and outside Lebanon to prosecute those accused in all the assassinations, not just the one that killed the former prime minister. MPs from Hezbollah and Amal, Lebanon’s two armed militias and political parties, stormed out of the session and say they may never return.
More powerful than the actual facts of this story are the impact it has upon the average Lebanese who has been under the yoke of the Syrian death squads for over 20 years. For example Lebanese Blogger Across the Bay speaks with great passion emotion of the latest Syrian murder of one of his country's true patriots:
Journalist and MP Gebran Tueni was assassinated earlier today.
It's very difficult for me to write right now, and I'll have to come back to this later. For now, I'll quote Walid Jumblat: "Someone told Russian TV that imposing sanctions on Syria would destabilize the Middle East. It looks as if the destabilization has started. But we will respond by continuing to demand the truth."I'm also listening live to PM Seniora: "We will not succumb. ... The will to live has never been and will never be defeated in Lebanon."
Update: Although I haven't had the ability to blog today, I've been updating my Quick Links with related links. Take a look.Also, don't miss the commentary of Kais, The Lebanese Bloggers, The Lebanese Political Journal, Mustapha, Stacey Yadav, Caveman, and Ammar Abdulhamid. Also, Lazarus has been updating regularly. For more from the Lebanese blogosphere, head over to Open Lebanon. I will come back with commentary of my own asap.PS: I also see Michael Totten is back.
Update 2: Michael Young pens Gebran's eulogy. Alas, it wasn't long ago that he eulogized another An-Nahar columnist and fiery critic of the Syrian thugocracy, Samir Qassir.
Update 3: For better or worse, my numbness has placed an involuntary guard over my mouth. So, for now, I'll refrain from commenting on this. But the comment is coming.
Update 4: Ammar Abdulhamid beat me to the punch.
Addendum: It's mo
Isn't it time that the world stopped screwing around with evil regimes like those ruling Syria (and Lebanon) and Iran with a Hitler- or Stalin-era reign of terror as its model. It's funny to me that the formerly Soviet states in Eastern Europe have very little problem understanding the need to rid the world of such regimes. Meanwhile Western Europe continues to sit back placidly and do absolutely nothing. Sound familiar? Et tu Neville?
John Bolton is right on the money about Syria:
Unhappy with Syria's poor cooperation with the investigation into the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton said December 13 that he is working with Security Council members to find a way to keep the pressure on Damascus to cooperate fully with the U.N.-mandated inquiry.
"On the part of the U.S., there's no wavering from the proposition that Syria is not going to get away with obstructing this investigation," Bolton told journalists outside the Security Council chambers. "It's not going to cover up the actions of its senior officials, and it's not going to escape the consequences."
The Security Council's "word is at stake now," the ambassador said. "The council has given Syria a requirement of full and immediate cooperation. That requirement has not been met and for the council's credibility to be preserved, it has to ensure that the pressure and requirement of Syrian compliance continue."
The Security Council met in both open and closed sessions December 13 with Detlev Mehlis, head of the International Independent Investigation Commission (UNIIIC). Mehlis said that in the seven weeks since the council passed a resolution demanding Syrian cooperation he has been "trying hard to make headway" with Syrian officials.
Working with Syria has been marked by "conflicting signals," and uncertainty over who was the appointed contact person caused "confusion and delays," Mehlis said. Syria finally allowed the commission to interview five Syrian witnesses just one week before the commission's mandate was set to expire.
"At this rate the investigation may take a year or two to complete," Mehlis said. (See related article.)
The commission's mandate is set to expire December 15, but Lebanon has requested the council extend it for another six months and to expand the investigation to help solve the string of assassinations and terrorist attacks on politicians and journalists from October 2004 up to the December 12 murder of Gibran Tueni. Security Council members have indicated that they will grant the Lebanese request. (See related article.)
SYRIAN COOPERATION "GRUDGING AT BEST"
Bolton said that Syria has failed to meet its obligations for full and complete cooperation with the commission. (See related article.)
"Syrian cooperation has been grudging at best," the U.S. ambassador said. "They tried the lowest common denominator approach to see what they can get away with."
"This is obstruction of justice on their part and we are looking for ways of making sure the international pressure on Syria is unrelenting, that their obligations to cooperate with the commission are not mistaken, and that they don't think they can try a 5 percent solution and find we're satisfied with it, because we are most emphatically not satisfied with it," he said.
Meetings would be held in Washington overnight to review the Mehlis report and decide on a course of action, Bolton said.
U.S. experience has been that Syria "responds only to pressure," he continued. "So we are considering what additional pressure we will bring to bear."
The ambassador added that "the Syrians hold the key to this themselves."
"If they complied with [Security Council resolutions] 1636, 1595, 1559 -- it's a long list these days, getting longer -- they could put themselves back in the good graces of the international community," Bolton said.
(note to self: must look into why the Democrats doen't want a straight shooter in the UN; could it be that they don't want the Bush Administration to be successful at ANYTHING? Even to the detriment of their own homeland?)
Yesterday, after a quiet spell that lasted almost three months, the terrifying wave of car bomb assassinations against anti-Syrian journalists and political figures started up again in Lebanon. This time the target was Gebran Tueni, the editor-in-chief of An Nahar newspaper and a recently elected member of parliament. Three people were killed and at least thirty people were wounded when his car exploded in the town of Mekalis in the mountains above Beirut.
Tueni had only just arrived in Lebanon from France the day before after hiding out from assassins. He knew the death squads were still active and had him on their hit list. Perhaps, like many who live in Beirut, he thought the danger had passed when clearly it hadn’t.
Mere hours later UN Special Prosecutor Detlev Mehlis released his second report in his investigation into the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. The new report claims that Syrian officials burned “all the Syrian intelligence documents concerning Lebanon.” Tueni was one of many witnesses interviewed by Mehlis in the investigation.
Gebran Tueni was a journalist, but he was not a reporter. He was both an editor and an editorial writer. Perhaps more than anyone else writing in Arabic inside Lebanon, he fiercely demanded freedom and democracy not only for Lebanese citizens but for Syrian citizens, too. The Cedar Revolution that ousted Syrian troops from the country earlier this year counted him as a hero.
The Lebanese Cabinet decided to ask the United Nations to create an international court both inside and outside Lebanon to prosecute those accused in all the assassinations, not just the one that killed the former prime minister. MPs from Hezbollah and Amal, Lebanon’s two armed militias and political parties, stormed out of the session and say they may never return.
More powerful than the actual facts of this story are the impact it has upon the average Lebanese who has been under the yoke of the Syrian death squads for over 20 years. For example Lebanese Blogger Across the Bay speaks with great passion emotion of the latest Syrian murder of one of his country's true patriots:
Journalist and MP Gebran Tueni was assassinated earlier today.
It's very difficult for me to write right now, and I'll have to come back to this later. For now, I'll quote Walid Jumblat: "Someone told Russian TV that imposing sanctions on Syria would destabilize the Middle East. It looks as if the destabilization has started. But we will respond by continuing to demand the truth."I'm also listening live to PM Seniora: "We will not succumb. ... The will to live has never been and will never be defeated in Lebanon."
Update: Although I haven't had the ability to blog today, I've been updating my Quick Links with related links. Take a look.Also, don't miss the commentary of Kais, The Lebanese Bloggers, The Lebanese Political Journal, Mustapha, Stacey Yadav, Caveman, and Ammar Abdulhamid. Also, Lazarus has been updating regularly. For more from the Lebanese blogosphere, head over to Open Lebanon. I will come back with commentary of my own asap.PS: I also see Michael Totten is back.
Update 2: Michael Young pens Gebran's eulogy. Alas, it wasn't long ago that he eulogized another An-Nahar columnist and fiery critic of the Syrian thugocracy, Samir Qassir.
Update 3: For better or worse, my numbness has placed an involuntary guard over my mouth. So, for now, I'll refrain from commenting on this. But the comment is coming.
Update 4: Ammar Abdulhamid beat me to the punch.
Addendum: It's mo
Isn't it time that the world stopped screwing around with evil regimes like those ruling Syria (and Lebanon) and Iran with a Hitler- or Stalin-era reign of terror as its model. It's funny to me that the formerly Soviet states in Eastern Europe have very little problem understanding the need to rid the world of such regimes. Meanwhile Western Europe continues to sit back placidly and do absolutely nothing. Sound familiar? Et tu Neville?
John Bolton is right on the money about Syria:
Unhappy with Syria's poor cooperation with the investigation into the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton said December 13 that he is working with Security Council members to find a way to keep the pressure on Damascus to cooperate fully with the U.N.-mandated inquiry.
"On the part of the U.S., there's no wavering from the proposition that Syria is not going to get away with obstructing this investigation," Bolton told journalists outside the Security Council chambers. "It's not going to cover up the actions of its senior officials, and it's not going to escape the consequences."
The Security Council's "word is at stake now," the ambassador said. "The council has given Syria a requirement of full and immediate cooperation. That requirement has not been met and for the council's credibility to be preserved, it has to ensure that the pressure and requirement of Syrian compliance continue."
The Security Council met in both open and closed sessions December 13 with Detlev Mehlis, head of the International Independent Investigation Commission (UNIIIC). Mehlis said that in the seven weeks since the council passed a resolution demanding Syrian cooperation he has been "trying hard to make headway" with Syrian officials.
Working with Syria has been marked by "conflicting signals," and uncertainty over who was the appointed contact person caused "confusion and delays," Mehlis said. Syria finally allowed the commission to interview five Syrian witnesses just one week before the commission's mandate was set to expire.
"At this rate the investigation may take a year or two to complete," Mehlis said. (See related article.)
The commission's mandate is set to expire December 15, but Lebanon has requested the council extend it for another six months and to expand the investigation to help solve the string of assassinations and terrorist attacks on politicians and journalists from October 2004 up to the December 12 murder of Gibran Tueni. Security Council members have indicated that they will grant the Lebanese request. (See related article.)
SYRIAN COOPERATION "GRUDGING AT BEST"
Bolton said that Syria has failed to meet its obligations for full and complete cooperation with the commission. (See related article.)
"Syrian cooperation has been grudging at best," the U.S. ambassador said. "They tried the lowest common denominator approach to see what they can get away with."
"This is obstruction of justice on their part and we are looking for ways of making sure the international pressure on Syria is unrelenting, that their obligations to cooperate with the commission are not mistaken, and that they don't think they can try a 5 percent solution and find we're satisfied with it, because we are most emphatically not satisfied with it," he said.
Meetings would be held in Washington overnight to review the Mehlis report and decide on a course of action, Bolton said.
U.S. experience has been that Syria "responds only to pressure," he continued. "So we are considering what additional pressure we will bring to bear."
The ambassador added that "the Syrians hold the key to this themselves."
"If they complied with [Security Council resolutions] 1636, 1595, 1559 -- it's a long list these days, getting longer -- they could put themselves back in the good graces of the international community," Bolton said.
(note to self: must look into why the Democrats doen't want a straight shooter in the UN; could it be that they don't want the Bush Administration to be successful at ANYTHING? Even to the detriment of their own homeland?)
