The UN-backed court probing the 2005 murder of Lebanon’s former prime minister Rafiq Hariri said Wednesday it had enough evidence to try four Hizbullah members, as it published the full indictment.

Lebanon’s Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah speaks on television, as a waiter serves food at a restaurant in the port-city of Sidon, southern Lebanon August 17, 2011. Nasrallah said an indictment accusing four members of the militant Shi’ite group of taking part in killing statesman Rafik al-Hariri contained “no direct evidence” against them. Nasrallah delivered the speech during an Iftar, the evening meal with which Muslims break their fast during the Islamic month of Ramadan, held by the women of the Islamic Resistance Support Association in Lebanon. REUTERS/Ali Hashisho

“The pre-trial judge has ordered that his decision confirming the indictment related to the 14 February 2005 attack, as well as the indictment itself, be made public,” the Special Tribunal for Lebanon said.

The judge found “the prosecution has presented sufficient evidence on a prima facie basis to proceed to trial,” the Hague-based tribunal added in a statement, welcomed by the court’s chief prosecutor Daniel A. Bellemare.

Judge Daniel Fransen last month ordered confidentiality around the names and charges against Salim Ayyash, 47, Mustafa Badreddine, 50, Hussein Anaissi, 37 and Assad Sabra, 34, be partially dropped.

Ayyash and Badreddine face charges of “committing a terrorist act by means of an explosive device” and homicide, while Anaissi and Sabra faced charges of conspiring to commit the same acts in the massive bomb blast that killed Hariri and 22 others.

Tribunal prosecutor Bellemare welcomed the tribunal’s order to unseal the indictment, saying he will push ahead with preparations for the trial.

“This order will finally inform the public and the victims about the facts alleged in the indictment regarding the commission of the crime that led to charging the four accused,” Bellemare said in a separate statement.

More than 20,000 pages of evidence were filed with the indictment which Bellemare’s office claimed “corroborates the following factual allegations and charges included in the indictment.”

The prosecutor accused Badreddine of “being the overall controller of the attack,” said a summary of the indictment.

“Ayyash coordinated the assassination team that was responsible for the physical perpetration of the attack,” the summary added.

“Anaissi and Sabra, in addition to being conspirators, prepared and delivered a false claim of responsibility video, which sought to blame the wrong people,” it said.

It claimed an assassination team “consisting of Ayyash and others positioned themselves in several locations where they were able to track and observe Hariri’s convoy,” on February 14, 2005.

It also gives a timeline of Hariri’s movements up until 12:55 local time, when a “male suicide bomber detonated a large quantity of explosives concealed in the cargo area of a… van, killing Hariri and 21 other victims and injuring 231.”

Nasrallah slams UN tribunal for lacking evidence

Hizbullah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah spoke in a television speech on Wednesday, saying that the Special Tribunal lacked sufficient evidence to implicate members of the Lebanese group in the 2005 murder.

Nasrallah continued: “What the tribunal published confirms what we have been saying for months, that the investigation is neither transparent nor scientific,” after the Netherlands-based court unsealed its indictment. 

“There is no direct evidence in the entire text, the investigation was built on coincidental telephone communications,” the Shi’a leader added. “It is unacceptable that four of our honorable brothers in the resistance be accused, rather, be victims of slander and injustice.”

Nasrallah also accused the court of aiming to “destroy the human and social fabric of Lebanon.”