Hariri murder: Ex-security chiefs caught

Lebanon arrested three former pro-Syrian security chiefs over the murder of ex-premier Rafik Hariri, the first major development in the probe six months after the attack that sent shockwaves through the nation.

The head of the presidential guard Mustafa Hamdan has also turned himself in to U.N. investigators after Lebanon issued an arrest warrant against him, security sources said.

The three arrested men were named as former general security chief Jamil al-Sayed, ex-military intelligence chief Raymond Azar and former internal security chief Ali al-Hage, a security source told AFP.

Several other people were also arrested, while a warrant has also been issued for former pro-Damascus minister Nasser Qandil.

They are the first major arrests in the probe into the February killing of Hariri, whose death in a massive Beirut bomb blast plunged Lebanon into turmoil and increased the pressure on Syria to pull out its troops in April.

The assassination of the five-time billionaire prime minister was blamed by many in Lebanon on long-time powerbroker Syria and its allies in the Lebanese government at the time.

Hamdan, who was appointed by Damascus protege President Emile Lahoud shortly after he took office in 1998, was questioned as a suspect and his office and house searched by the U.N. team investigating the murder.

Lahoud himself has long denied allegations of complicity in the assassination and resisted pressure to stand down.

Damascus has come under mounting international criticism over a failure to answer questions in the U.N. probe into Hariri's death headed by German prosecutor Detlev Mehlis.

The Mehlis commission can ask the Lebanese authorities to issue warrants for those suspected of involvement in the murder.

Last week, the U.N. Security Council called on Syria to fully cooperate, with the United States calling Damascus' stance "unacceptable".

Assad: We will cooperate fully

U.N. Under Secretary General Ibrahim Gambari said the commission of inquiry had sent a request to Damascus last month asking for documents and interviews of five witnesses, but: "No reply has been received."

"There is no doubt... that Syria's lack of cooperation with the Mehlis investigation has considerably slowed down the Mehlis commission's work. This lack of cooperation is unacceptable," the U.S. envoy to the U.N. John Bolton said.

Since then, Syrian President Bashar Assad has pledged that Damascus would cooperate with the UN probe, and again denied that his regime had anything to do with the killing.

"We will cooperate fully," Assad said in an interview with German weekly Der Spiegel published on Monday.

"We care about this investigation because we believe that we will be cleared -- unless the findings are skewed by political motive. Syria had nothing to do with this killing, absolutely nothing," he added.

Hariri's killing triggered a major political upheaval in Lebanon and paved the way for legislative elections in May and June which for the first time saw anti-Syrian politicians dominate parliament.

But since the February 14 attack, there have been 11 bomb blasts in Lebanon, and several anti-Syrian figures including a politician and a journalist have been killed.

Hariri’s murder proved to be a turning point in Lebanon’s history, as it aroused a wave of protests that led to the withdrawal of Syrian forces from the country and to national elections, which were won by the anti-Syria opposition bloc, led by Hariri’s son Saad.

Hariri’s former right-hand man Fuad Siniora was appointed to the post of prime minister shortly thereafter.

Roee Nahmias contributed to this report