BEIRUT
Former Lebanese prime minister Saad Hariri has urged leader of Shiite militant group Hezbollah Hassan Nasrallah to withdraw the group fighters from Syria and hand over suspects accused of assassinating his father, ex-premier Rafiq Hariri.
Hariri was killed in 2005 in a deadly Beirut car bombing. Five Hezbollah members stand accused by a Special Tribunal for Lebanon over the assassination, but Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah, for his part, has denounced the international tribunal as an "American-Israeli plot."
Speaking to Future TV, the mouthpiece of his Future Movement, Hariri said that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad was responsible for the killing of his father.
"Al-Assad is the one who ordered the assassination of my father," Hariri said, slamming the Syrian leader as a "killer who preaches about justice while killing his own people."
Hariri also hailed as a "significant achievement for Lebanon" the trial of Hezbollah suspects, which is underway in The Hague, saying it would put an end to Lebanon's record of assassinations.
Military involvement by Hezbollah in Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's ongoing military conflict with armed opposition groups in Syria has drawn condemnation from the group's opponents in Lebanon.
By Hamza Takeen
englishnews@aa.com.tr
