UN Appoints Hariri Team (Updated)

OK, so I was a little off. I conjured up a 2011 date for the UN to send its investigatory team to Lebanon, based on the amount of time it took to send a team to investigate the 1999 attrocities in East Timor. The UN bested that prediction, and a team is assembled and will be wending its way Beiruit-ward shortly.

Actually, Kofi might have made a pretty good pick here. Leading the team will be Peter Fitzgerald, a Deputy Police Commissioner of the Irish national police force. It would seem a big time Irish cop would have considerable experience in the investigation of blowing-people-up crimes.

Update: Here's an interesting question sequence from today's UN press briefing on Fitzgerald and the investigation:

Question: The team that’s going to Beirut, does it have a mandate broad enough to follow it; to see it as a political assassination rather than as a crime? And if so, will it have access to intelligence or to staffing capable of dealing with a probe that might involve Syria or any of the militias currently operating in Lebanon?

Spokesman: I don’t think they go with any preconceived notion of the nature of the killing of Mr. Hariri. If you know Mr. Fitzgerald, he is a very distinguished police commissioner who has worked on a number of UN peacekeeping missions and has also done investigative work for us before. So I think you will see a police action looking at evidence and trying to reconstitute how this crime was committed and, if possible, who committed it. They’re starting in Lebanon. And if they feel they need to go wider than Lebanon as part of the inquiry, they will do so.

Question: Fred, just a follow up on that, I’m sorry, Fred.

Spokesman: Yes?

Question: Did Annan speak to the Syrians about this investigation? The Lebanese have obviously said that they welcome this. But did Annan have any conversations with the Syrians or anyone...(Inaudible)?

Spokesman: I’ll have to look into that for you. I don’t know that.

With all signs pointing to Syrians, one would think Annan would be speaking to the Syrians about cooperating in the investigation! But then ...