BEIRUT – The head of Hizbullah’s parliamentary bloc dismissed a U.N.-backed court’s indictment into former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri’s 2005 assassination as worthless, in the latest exchange of tough rhetoric with the March 14 coalition.

“This indictment is not worth the ink with which it was written. It is aimed at mobilizing the international public opinion and provoking Arab and Muslim states and Latin and North America against the resistance and something called Hizbullah in Lebanon in the hope they can succeed in surrounding the resistance and tightening the noose around it psychologically, politically, financially and socially,” MP Mohammad Raad, head of Hizbullah’s Loyalty to the Resistance bloc in Parliament, told a rally in the southern town of Kfar Fila.

Raad called the indictment which implicated members of Hizbullah in Hariri’s assassination a lie.

Referring to the Hizbullah-Israel war in the summer of 2006, Raad said: “He who has withstood your world war in 2006 finds it easy to tolerate your latest lie through the indictment. As your goals were thwarted in the 2006 war, the ramifications of this lie will be thwarted and will also boomerang on you and on anyone who got involved in concocting plots, rumors and false accusations and allegations which have no proof at all.”

Raad’s remarks came after the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) issued its long-awaited indictment June 30, accusing four Hizbullah members of involvement in Hariri’s assassination and demanded their arrest. 

Breaking a nearly four-month silence, former Prime Minister Saad Hariri launched a blistering attack last Tuesday on Hizbullah and Prime Minister Najib Mikati, whom he described as “Hizbullah’s surrogate,” vowing to topple his government through “a strong opposition” by the March 14 coalition.

Hariri for the first time publicly blamed Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and Hizbullah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah for the toppling of his Cabinet on Jan. 12 when March 8 ministers resigned in a long-running dispute over a U.N.-backed court seeking to uncover the killers of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

Hariri also pledged not to compromise on truth and justice in the 2005 assassination of his father, saying that Hizbullah’s rejection of the U.N.-backed Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) will not stop its work.

In a wide-ranging live television interview from his residence in Paris, Hariri warned that Lebanon would pay a price if Hizbullah did not cooperate with the STL by handing over the four party members who were accused by the STL’s long-awaited indictment of involvement in the massive bombing that killed Hariri and 22 others on Feb. 14, 2005. 

“If Hizbullah did not cooperate with the tribunal, then Lebanon would pay the price,” the head of the Future Movement told Lebanese television station MTV.

“If this was Saad Hariri’s government, we could have definitely searched for them [four Hizbullah suspects] and transferred them to the tribunal,” Hariri said. “There are accused persons now. They must appear before the tribunal.”

“There will be no compromise on truth and justice,” Hariri said. “There will be no stability without justice.”

Hariri said he decided to break silence in order to put an end to the “misleading” campaign by the Hizbullah-led March 8 alliance against the STL’s indictment.

“Sayyed Hasan [Nasrallah] said recently that the tribunal was an Israeli court, that it had previously issued its decisions and it was infiltrated. What I want to say is that if Sayyed Hassan appeared at 300 press conferences, this will not change anything in the indictment which has been issued,” he said.

Nasrallah has rejected the STL’s indictment, vowing never to turn over the four accused members. In a defiant speech on July 2, Nasrallah dismissed the tribunal as an “American-Israeli court,” saying that Lebanese authorities will not be able to arrest the four suspects “even in 300 years.”

The release of the STL’s indictment came on the same day Prime Minister Najib Mikati’s Cabinet approved its policy statement which stressed Lebanon’s respect of U.N. resolutions and pledged to follow the tribunal’s path in order to reach the truth in Hariri’s assassination.

Hariri’s parliamentary Future bloc and its March 14 allies blasted the government’s policy statement, saying it put Lebanon in a confrontation with the international community and led to a coup against the STL.

Hizbullah’s Agriculture Minister Hussein al-Haj Hasan accused the March 14 parties of using the STL to further their own personal agenda.

“The Security Council, which is dominated by the United States, appointed the investigation commission and the tribunal. How can this tribunal be free from U.S. intervention and U.S. interests? We want and demand justice, while you [March 14] want to use the tribunal to serve your personal purposes,” Haj Hassan told a crowd at a food festival in the eastern city of Baalbek.

Energy Minister Jibran Bassil criticized the opposition’s call on the international community not to cooperate with the government if it fails to commit to the STL.

“We see an opposition which we firstly called subversive. But after what we have witnessed in the vote of confidence discussion in the Parliament we call it a ‘childish’ opposition,” Bassil said.

“Can you imagine there are people working to attract investments and money and in return there are people who are demanding a halt the investments, money and measures of siege. They are people who are impertinently calling on the international community to freeze the country’s assets and sever its relations with Lebanon,” Bassil said.

Hariri told MTV that he stayed outside Lebanon all this time to give the rival March 8 coalition a chance to form a government. He indicated that he would stay outside the country for a while longer but vowed to return.

“I will return to Beirut as soon as possible,” Hariri said, refusing to give an exact date on his return.

“My absence from Beirut is my own choice at this stage so that the brothers could form the government since I’m always accused of obstructing things in the country,” the former prime minister said.

Hariri dismissed reports that he was in exile due to security concerns, saying: “Threats have been around since 2005,” referring to the period following the assassination of his father, Rafik Hariri.