Instead, it remained common practice for the New York Times and the rest of the mainstream U.S. news media to continue citing the Mehlis report and referring to "Syrian officials implicated in Mr. Hariri's killing" without providing more context.
That pattern continued with Young's article last year, with the online version linking to a 2005 story that trumpeted Mehlis's initial report. Young and the Times cited no articles describing the subsequent collapse of Mehlis's case.
In 2009, the UN tribunal examining Hariri's murder and other terrorist acts in Lebanon had acknowledged that it lacked the evidence to indict the four Lebanese security officials who had been held without formal charges since 2005. Finally, Judge Daniel Fransen of a special international tribunal ordered the four imprisoned security officials released.
In a similar situation -- say, one that involved a U.S. ally -- the release would have been viewed as proof of innocence or at least the absence of significant evidence of guilt.
In this case, however, the New York Times refused to acknowledge the obvious fact that Mehlis's initial case against Syria had been weak. Instead, the Times blamed "the legal pitfalls of a divisive international trial." [NYT, April 30, 2009]
The Stolen Van
There was also the question of the white Mitsubishi Canter Van that was identified as the vehicle carrying the bomb. According to Mehlis's initial report, a Japanese forensic team matched 44 of 69 pieces of the van's wreckage to Canter parts manufactured by Mitsubishi Fuso Corp. and even identified the specific vehicle.
So, the van's chain of possession would seem to be a crucial lead in identifying the killers. But Mehlis issued his first report suggesting Syrian guilt before that trail had been followed.
At that point, Mehlis only stated that the Japanese forensic team had learned that the van had been reported stolen in Sagamihara City, Japan, on Oct. 12, 2004. There were no details about the Japanese investigation of the theft, nor any indications about the identity of the thieves or how the van might have gone from a suburb of Tokyo to Beirut.
A subsequent update to Mehlis's report added some more intriguing clues about the van, tracking its arrival in the Middle East to port facilities in the United Arab Emirates.
But who picked it up in Dubai? How did it get from Dubai to Beirut?
While not detailing the investigation in the UAE, the update disclosed that UN investigators had sought help from "UAE authorities to trace the movements of this vehicle, including reviewing shipping documents from the UAE and, with the assistance of the UAE authorities, attempting to locate and interview the consignees of the container in which the vehicle or its parts is believed to have been shipped."
However, after Mehlis's investigation collapsed -- and Brammertz was named to replace him -- the United Nations put a tighter lid on the probe. So, it remains unclear if the investigators ever determined who got the stolen van and how it made the final leg of its fateful journey.
Center of Intrigue
What is clear, however, is that Lebanon is regarded by the United States and its regional allies as an important battleground in their geopolitical struggle with Iran. According to classified State Department cables released by WikiLeaks, Saudi Arabia even discussed a military intervention in Lebanon in 2008 under cover of UN peacekeepers.
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