Mandate of UN-backed Lebanon tribunal (STL) extended for three more years

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Five members of Hezbollah are being tried in absentia for the 2005 bombing that assassinated former Lebanese PM Rafik Hariri . The defendants, clockwise from top: Hussein Hassan Oneissi, Salim Jamil Ayyash, Assad Hassan Sabra, Hassan Habib Merhi and Mustafa Amine Badreddine.
Five members of Hezbollah are being tried in absentia for the 2005 bombing that assassinated former Lebanese PM Rafik Hariri . The defendants, clockwise from top: Hussein Hassan Oneissi, Salim Jamil Ayyash, Assad Hassan Sabra, Hassan Habib Merhi and Mustafa Amine Badreddine.

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres extended for another three years the mandate of the tribunal set up to try those accused of carrying out the February 2005 attack in Beirut, which killed 22 people, including the former Prime Minister of Lebanon, Rafiq Hariri, and injured many others.

The trial in absentia of five individuals indicted over the killing began in January 2014 at the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, which is based near The Hague in the Netherlands, and is currently ongoing.

The Tribunal’s mandate has been extended from 1 March 2018 for a period of three years, or upon the completion of the cases before it if sooner.

“The United Nations looks forward to the completion of the mandate of the Special Tribunal in a timely manner,” spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric said in a statement.

The Tribunal also has jurisdiction over attacks carried out in Lebanon between 1 October 2004 and 12 December 2005 if they are connected to the attack of 14 February 2005 and are of a similar nature and gravity.

UN .ORG

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