VZCZCXRO1607
PP RUEHAG RUEHBC RUEHDE RUEHKUK RUEHROV
DE RUEHLB #0207/01 0390955
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
P 080955Z FEB 07
FM AMEMBASSY BEIRUT
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 7369
INFO RUEHEE/ARAB LEAGUE COLLECTIVE
RUCNMEM/EU MEMBER STATES COLLECTIVE
RHMFISS/CDR USCENTCOM MACDILL AFB FL
RHEHNSC/NSC WASHDC

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 BEIRUT 000207 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
NSC FOR ABRAMS/DORAN/MARCHESE/HARDING 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/06/2017 
TAGS: PGOV KCRM PTER SHUM LE SY
SUBJECT: LEBANON:  LAWYER FOR JAILED GENERAL JAMIL AS-SAYED 
MAKES HIS CASE FOR RELEASE 
 
 
Classified By: Jeffrey Feltman, Ambassador.  Reason:  Sections 1.4 (b) 
and (d). 
 
SUMMARY 
------- 
 
¶1.  (C)  Akram Azoury, attorney for the jailed former head of 
Lebanon's Surete Generale, Jamil as-Sayed, met with DCM 
February 5 to present the case for as-Sayed's release from 
prison.  Azoury, a respected human rights lawyer, said that 
the only basis for the Lebanese government's incarceration of 
as-Sayed had been testimony given to the UNIIIC by the Syrian 
national Zouhair Saddik, who has since been discredited as a 
witness.  Azoury reports that Prosecutor General Said Mirza 
so much as admitted to UNIIIC Commissioner Serge Brammertz 
that as-Sayed remains in jail for political rather than 
criminal reasons.  Azoury believes that Mirza and 
Investigative Judge Elias Eid will not release as-Sayed 
unless they receive a political green light to do so, with 
Sa'ad Hariri and Walid Jumblatt controlling this political 
decision.  Azoury cited Brammertz's December 12 report as 
signalling that Brammertz no longer felt there was reason to 
keep as-Sayed in jail.  Azoury also argued that as-Sayed's 
release from prison would enhance the political credibility 
of the UNIIIC and Special Tribunal.  Finally, Azoury supplied 
us with four recommendations for changes in the statute that 
would govern the Special Tribunal.  None are of great 
substance, and unsurprisingly, all would run to the benefit 
of Azoury's client, as-Sayed.  End Summary. 
 
¶2.  (C)  This past week, Akram Azoury, attorney for jailed 
former Surete General Director General Jamil as-Sayed, sent 
two documents to the Ambassador, over a cover letter in 
as-Sayed's name.  Both texts were addressed to Lebanese 
Prosecutor General Said Mirza and Investigative Judge Elias 
Eid, and submitted by Azoury in as-Sayed's name.  The first 
document, dated December 14, 2006, asks for withdrawal of the 
arrest warrant against Jamil as-Sayed, based on the content 
of UNIIIC Commissioner Serge Brammertz's December 12 report 
to the UN Secretary General.  The second document, dated 
January 9, 2007, criticizes the non-responsiveness of the 
Lebanese judicial system to as-Sayed's previous entreaties 
for release.  It also argues in more detail that his 
continued incarceration is politically motivated. 
 
AS-SAYED'S EXONERATION 
---------------------- 
 
¶3.  (C)  On February 5, DCM hosted for lunch Akram Azoury, 
who was accompanied by Jamil as-Sayed's son Malek, also a 
lawyer.  Azoury has kept in contact with DCM and other Perm-5 
Embassy officials in Beirut since the outset of as-Sayed's 
incarceration.  He said that Commissioner Brammertz's latest 
report, issued December 12, 2006, confirms that Brammertz no 
longer believes that there is an evidentiary basis for 
keeping as-Sayed in jail.  Accordingly, Investigative Judge 
Eid should release him immediately. 
 
¶4.  (C)  Azoury said that the sole basis for jailing as-Sayed 
in late August, 2005 had been testimony that former UNIIIC 
Commissioner Detlev Mehlis drew from a Syrian witness, 
Zouhair Saddik.  Since then, Saddik's testimony has been 
discredited by contradictions and inconsistencies with known 
facts.  His unreliable character was demonstrated when he 
absconded to France.  Azoury said that Brammertz told Judges 
Mirza and Eid of Saddik's lies and contradictions in a 
meeting that took place in Mirza's office on December 8, four 
days before Brammertz released his report.  This is the 
reason, Azoury continued, why Brammertz signalled in his 
report that Jamil as-Sayed should be released.  The relevant 
language came in para 96 of Brammertz's December 12 report. 
This text reads in pertinent part:  "The Commission regularly 
shares with the appropriate Lebanese authorities the 
substance of all relevant information that it obtains . . . 
this includes an analytical report on the credibility of a 
witness, recently transmitted to the Prosecutor General and 
the Investigative Judge assigned to the Hariri case.  This 
process is of particular importance where the information is 
relevant to individuals who are detained. . ." 
 
¶5.  (C)  DCM responded that para 10 of Brammertz's December 
report noted that the UN Commission and the Prosecutor 
General's office might refrain from placing certain 
information in the public domain.  Was this caveat relevant 
here and thus could there be other information against 
as-Sayed, beyond the Saddiq testimony?  Azoury admitted the 
point about para 10, but said it was not a factor in the 
 
BEIRUT 00000207  002 OF 003 
 
 
case.  Former UNIIIC Commissioner Mehlis had recommended the 
jailing of as-Sayed solely on the basis of the Saddik 
testimony.  No further incriminating information has been 
found.  In sum, Azoury said, even Commissioner Brammertz has 
now declared that Jamil as-Sayed should no longer be in jail. 
 s for as-Sayed's plans if he were released, Azoury said 
as-Sayed would stay in Lebanon and comply with any other 
terms imposed upon him. 
 
¶6.  (C)  Azoury said that it will take a political "green 
light" for Mirza and Eid to release as-Sayed.  Judges in 
Lebanon, he commented, still retain the mentality, left over 
from the Syrian occupation, that they cannot take major 
judicial decisions without clear approval from those who 
wield political power.  Azoury said that in as-Sayed's case, 
the political decision-makers will be Future Movement leader 
Saad Hariri and Druse leader Walid Jumblatt.  Azoury observed 
that as-Sayed has the highest political profile of the four 
generals jailed since August 2005, but he had the least to do 
with the assassination of Hariri or the subsequent 
investigation.  By contrast, jailed General Mustafa Hamdan, 
former head of the Presidential Guard, has the lowest 
political profile, but was the most involved in the 
assassination, especially in compromising the crime site in 
the hours and days after the Hariri bombing.  Azoury said 
that the other two jailed generals, former head of the 
Internal Security Forces Ali al-Hajj and former head of 
Lebanese Armed Forces intelligence (G-2) Raymond Azar, fall 
in between as-Sayed and Hamdan, both in their political 
profiles and in their closeness to the assassination.  Azoury 
said that he has had no contact with the attorneys for the 
other generals.  He also commented that as-Sayed dislikes 
Hamdan personally. 
 
FLAWED JUSTICE; FOLLOWED UP 
--------------------------- 
 
¶7.  (C)  Azoury reported that he visited UNIIIC Commissioner 
Brammertz about six times between June and December of 2006. 
In each instance, Azoury's mesage has been that there is no 
substantial evidence against as-Sayed, that Judges Mirza and 
Eid have been unresponsive to well-grounded legal pleadings, 
and that Mirza and Eid are operating on political rather than 
juridical motives.  Azoury's memo of January 9, 2007 is far 
more pointed than any of his previous memoranda, alleging a 
series of statements by Mirza and Eid that contravene basic 
principles of justice.  This memo also recounts a threatening 
effort by former Commissioner Mehlis and his assistant 
Gerhard Lehmann to induce as-Sayed to finger a culprit, any 
culprit, in the Hariri assassination in return for 
exonerating as-Sayed himself.  Azoury had previously 
recounted this story to us only orally.  This time he put it 
in writing.  He also said that he has sent his memos of 
December 14 and January 9 to members of Lebanon's governing 
March 14 political coalition.  Finally, he added that he is 
suing Mehlis and Lehmann in Lebanese and German courts for 
false accusations and defamation of character. 
 
¶8.  (C)  As for political efforts to release as-Sayed, Azoury 
said that he raised the issue with his "old friend," Prime 
Minister Fouad Siniora.  Siniora sent him to see Justice 
Minister Charles Rizk.  Now, Rizk is reflecting upon the 
case, but mainly with a view toward his own presidential 
ambitions.  Azoury mentioned that a prominent French human 
rights lawyer with the organization "Solida" may soon come to 
Beirut to look into the case. 
 
¶9.  (C)  Azoury argued that releasing Jamil as-Sayed would 
enhance the credibility of the Special Tribunal process that 
has now engulfed Lebanon's internal political scene.  (Azoury 
noted here that Jamil as-Sayed himself favors early 
establishment of the Tribunal.)  As-Sayed's release, with 
some official acknowledgement that there is no credible 
evidence against him, would bolster confidence in the the 
Special Tribunal by showing that the UN-sponsored process can 
act fairly toward those who are accused, and render justice 
without regard to political imperatives. 
 
THE SPECIAL TRIBUNAL 
-------------------- 
 
¶10.  (C)  Quite understandably, Azoury had some ideas on the 
Special Tribunal to try suspects in the Hariri assassination 
and related crimes, as authorized in UNSC Resolution 1664. 
He said there is a distinction between the Special Tribunal 
for Lebanon and other international tribunals.  The Lebanese 
Tribunal is set up to try only a single case (and perhaps 
 
BEIRUT 00000207  003 OF 003 
 
 
other related cases), rather than broad-reaching charges of 
genocide.  The impact of this is that the Lebanon Tribunal 
will be adjudicating a classic criminal case, rather than 
seeking a political judgment of guilt for say, 100,000 deaths 
that have not been examined individually -- as had been the 
case with the Carla del Ponte prosecution of Slobodan 
Milosevic. 
 
¶11.  (C)  Azoury, after recounting the Tribunal's political 
difficulties in Lebanon, said a solution would be the 
following:  members of the Security Council should ask the 
new UN Secretary General to write a letter to the Lebanese, 
in which the SYG says that the "go sign" for the Tribunal 
will not be given until the Commission has finished its work 
of identifying the suspects in the assassination.  (Comment: 
On February 7, we ran this idea by Judge Ralph Riachy, one of 
the GOL's two judges who have been negotiating the Tribunal 
with the UN.  Riachy was entirely dismissive, saying that it 
is not the role of the UNIIIC to come up with such a 
definitive statement on who is guilty, or at least almost 
certainly guilty.  End Comment.) 
 
¶12.  (C)  Azoury also provided us with a paper on 
modifications to the proposed Statute for the Special 
Tribunal.  He makes four suggestions: 
 
--  There should be a mechanism to allow for the dismissal of 
judges, and for judges to recuse themselves. 
 
--  There should be a mechanism to allow for releasing 
suspects who are jailed provisionally. 
 
--  Legal recourses of the defendants (e.g., apppeals) should 
be provided for, independent of the Tribunal itself, since 
the Tribunal will pass out of existence at some future time. 
 
--  There should be a mechanism to hold the Tribunal's judges 
responsible for serious or intentional mistakes. 
 
We will find it interesting to see if the internal Lebanese 
political debate on the Tribunal picks up any of these 
proposals, all of which run to the favor of defendants. 
 
COMMENT 
------- 
 
¶13.  (C)  As we have reported before, this is an extremely 
awkward issue.  While hinting obliquely that he suspects 
as-Sayed's involvement in the Hariri assassination, UNIIIC 
Commissioner Brammertz has told us that he has no solid 
evidence that would meet international standards in 
justifying the ongoing detention of as-Sayed and the three 
other generals.  Brammertz has noted his discomfort with the 
human rights and legal aspects of these detentions.  But even 
Brammertz recognizes that releasing as-Sayed would be 
interpreted as an enormous victory for Syria and its Lebanese 
proxies.  Were as-Sayed freed, March 14 leaders would be 
demoralized, believing (perhaps rightly) that the 
investigation is much further from the truth than hoped. 
 
¶14.  (C)  Knowing of Brammertz' concerns, we have long urged 
the GOL to investigate how as-Sayed, a public servant, 
obtained the USD 20 million in his local bank accounts, in 
hopes that the GOL would be able to press other charges to 
keep him in jail.  The GOL has failed to follow up, perhaps 
out of fear of what would be discovered regarding the origin 
of those funds.  Given as-Sayed's power and connections to 
the Syrian occupying authorities for many years, surely the 
Lebanese could have found something on which to base his 
ongoing detention.  In any case, given Prosecutor General 
Mirza's general timidness and his close connections to the 
Hariri family, we do not expect Mirza to release as-Sayed 
soon. 
FELTMAN