UN Council working on measure for Lebanon tribunal

UNITED NATIONS, May 15 (Reuters) The United States expects a draft UN resolution by the end of the week that would create an international tribunal to prosecute suspects in the murder of a former Lebanese prime minster, the US ambassador said today.

The court, requested by the government of Prime Minister Fouad Siniora, and a majority of parliament members, is at the heart of Lebanon's worst political crisis since the 1975-90 civil war with a series of political killings of anti-Syrian figures. Syria has denied involvement.

Zalmay Khalilzad, the US ambassador to the United Nations and current Security Council president, said consultations had begun and ''we expect a draft resolution by the end of the week.'' ''It is important from our point of view to assist the Lebanese in the establishment of that tribunal,'' Khalilzad told reporters.

''We cannot let the Lebanese down.'' The United Nations had hoped Lebanon would agree on a law establishing the court after it asked the Security Council to to create the tribunal and investigate the killing of Rafik al-Hariri and 22 others in a bombing in Beirut on Febuary. 14, 2005. But Nabih Berri, the opposition parliamentary speaker, has refused to call a session to ratify the tribunal.

Siniora on Monday wrote a formal letter to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon asking that the Security Council take up Lebanon's request for the tribunal.

'' A binding decision regarding the tribunal on the part of the Security Council will be fully consistent with the importance the U.N. has attached to this matter,'' he wrote.

A binding decision usually refers to Chapter 7 of the U.N.

Charter, which makes an action mandatory for all U.N. members.

The United States, Britain and France back such a provision.

Chapter 7 also allows for the use of force but a separate council resolution would have to authorize it and such a move is virtually excluded. It is not clear whether the tribunal would be set up in Lebanon or elsewhere.

However, Russia, an ally of Syria has hesitated, with its U.N. ambassador, Vitaly Churkin, telling reporters earlier this month there was still time for the Lebanese to come to an agreement.

But Lebanese President Emile Lahoud, in his own letter to Ban on Tuesday, warned of renewed instability if the council moved to set up the court and ''would imply a full bypass of the constitutional mechanisms in Lebanon.'' He said that Siniora was ''falsifying facts to drag the Security Council ... into siding with one Lebanese party against the other,'' according to a text obtained in Beirut.

Both Berri and Lahoud are allies of Syria. Lebanese leaders who back Siniora's government accuse them of acting on Syrian orders to derail the court. They accuse Damascus of the Hariri killing and other killings, an allegation Syrian denies.

The opposition, which includes pro-Syria Hezbollah, has said it accepts the idea of the court but fear its will be used as a political tool and want to discuss its mandate.

REUTERS TB RK2304