Syrian- UN investigation contacts reached a standstill
With developments indicating that there is a crisis with the UN investigation committee which is chaired by the Detlev Mehlis, and the facts that contacts with it reached a standstill regarding the interrogation of the 6 Syrian officials, a source at the Syrian foreign ministry said that Mehlis persist on interrogating the Syrian officials in Lebanon, rejecting the Syrian proposal to interrogate them in another location.
The official who asked to be anonymous said that the ministry's legal advisor Riad al-Dawoudi met with Mehlis in Beirut last week. However, the said official said that the German investigator refused to discuss reasons for the Syrian concern over the location on where to interrogate with its officials and their proposals in this regard.
The Mehlis committee desires to meet the six Syrian officials in its headquarters in Monteverdi near the Lebanese capital of Beirut.
Al-Dawoudi proposed that the UN team to choose a place in Damascus to make interviews to be held at the headquarters of the Arab League in Cairo.
The source said that Mehlis seemed very insistent in his stand "and did not accept to discuss this matter, and no agreement was made on any of the matters proposed by al-Dawoudi."
In Bahrain, the Syrian foreign minister Farouk al-Sharaa expected on Saturday Washington to continue its pressure on his country, stressing that Damascus avoids have the investigation with its citizens done in Lebanon in order to "preserve its stability." The Syrian minister stressed that his country will cooperate with the committee "without reservation except on issues that relate to Syria's sovereignty." He renewed his country's proposal to carry out the investigation in any place in Syria under the UN flag or at the headquarters of the Arab league in Cairo.
In Damascus, hundreds of Syrian workers took the streets of the capital in a demonstration centered before the UN office in Damascus deploring the Mehlis committee and announcing support for President Bashar al-Assad.