Rafik Hariri top security guard Wissam a suspect, Lawyer tells STL

Defense lawyers for Hassan Merhi has suggested at the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) that ex-PM Rafik Hariri’s top security guard Brigadier Wissam al-Hassan should be considered a suspect in light of his unusual absence from Hariri’s convoy on the day of the February 2005 attack.

Shiite News Monitoring Desk cited that the leaked documents from the U.N. Special Tribunal for Lebanon indicated that prosecutors there entertained suspicions about Wissam’ alibi; yet Saad Hariri kept him within his inner circle and elevated him to higher positions of power. Diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks had revealed that Hassan was deeply distrusted by many of Saad Hariri’s allies, even as he was assailed by political opponents of March 14th for his mysterious dealings in the U.N. investigation. Lebanon witnessed continued whispering about his whereabouts during the 2005 assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri (father of Saad).
“He might be a suspect, seeing as he was a key official in ex-PM Hariri’s security detail who did not show up on the day of the bombing… This raises suspicions and doubts, which pushed al-Hassan to present an excuse and justify his absence by saying that he had an exam at the time,” Merhi’s defense said at a closing arguments session at the Special Tribunal for Lebanon’s headquarters in The Hague.
“It was unusual that he decided to take the exam although he could have succeeded without it. He was the head of ex-PM Hariri’s security detail, or in other words the top security authority in all his movements,” the defense added.
“The Prosecutor has not presented any evidence or convincing excuse to prove that al-Hassan had taken an official exam. I personally don’t know the type of exam he took. That’s why we have suspicions as a defense team. We are objective and the evidence does not at all suggest that he had a legitimate excuse or certain alibi not to be present in Hariri’s convoy on the day of the assassination,” the defense went on to say.
Separately, Merhi’s defense said the Prosecution’s evidence exhibits are insufficient regarding Ahmed Abu Adas, the Palestinian young man who was allegedly abducted by two Hizbullah suspects to appear in the video of the “false claim of responsibility.”
“We do not rule out that Abu Adas was present at the crime scene for three reasons. The first is that evidence revealed that the crime scene was largely contaminated and the investigations and analyses were all shameful, which allows us to conclude that not all human remains were collected for examination. Secondly, some of the remains were invalid for identification. Thirdly, Abu Adas’ character is of no value in the Prosecution’s hypothesis and the evidence it has presented lacks any verification value,” the defense added.
The defense also announced that by the end of its closing arguments, it will be able to prove that “Abu Adas was present” and that “his claim of responsibility was not fake but rather real.”
The STL is trying four suspects in absentia after it accused them of carrying out the attack on Hariri’s convoy. Hizbullah has turned down the STL proceedings because of its clear aim to implicate innocent people to cover-up the Israeli involvement in the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri who had also joined hands with Hizbullah that remained his coalition partner in the government as well.
Wissam was killed in 2012 and mystery still shrouds his death because he could have been eliminated by Israelis to cover up their role in the assassination of Rafik Hariri.