Hariri probe at 'critical phase'

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The UN inquiry into the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri is entering a critical phase, investigators have said.

Chief investigator Serge Brammertz said there are links between the Hariri murder and the 14 other attacks in Lebanon he has been asked to look at.

Mr Hariri was killed in a car bombing in February 2005.

Previous reports of the UN inquiry have implicated Syria in his death, a charge Damascus has denied.

Spread fear

In the commission's sixth report, Mr Brammertz said making information about witnesses and suspects public would only prejudice the case that should eventually be tried in front of an international tribunal.

The investigators were asked to look at 14 other attacks on associates of Mr Hariri which happened after his death.

This report says there are links between those later attacks and the Hariri murder and says the possible intent was to spread fear among the population and to destabilise the security situation.

Syria, heavily implicated in Mr Hariri's murder by previous reports of the commission, was criticised for not co-operating with the inquiry early on.

However, this report says Syria has provided a satisfactory level of assistance.

Following the murder in November of Pierre Gemayel, the anti-Syrian Lebanese cabinet minister, the commission expanded its work to help the Lebanese authorities investigate that death.