Tribunal has had enough time

It is a sad fact that the tribunal into the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri on February 14, 2005, has been misused to reinforce Syria's isolation.

The investigation has rambled on for over four-and-a-half years, and now it has yet again delayed the publication of its findings by several months. This is wrong. The tribunal should finish its work so that people can then make a balanced judgment and move on. The present stream of leaks and partial statements are all designed to twist and influence Lebanon's already tortured political scene.

The possibility that the government of Syria colluded in Hariri's assassination in February 2005 has been used to help the United States and its allies to keep Syria out of the mainstream of Arab politics. The cause of this isolation was Syria's continuing good relations with Iran. The Bush and Obama administrations both made Iran the touchstone of much of their Middle East policies. Their mistaken, overwhelming focus on countering the Iranian government meant that much of the rest of the Middle East has not received much attention in Washington.

It was a mistake to blur the focus of the tribunal by expanding its jurisdiction to include other attacks that occurred in Lebanon between October 1, 2004, and December 12, 2005. This gave the tribunal yet another reason to drag out the investigation and avoid coming to a clear verdict.

Lebanon has to be clear about the facts of Hariri's death, and be ready to act on any clear indications of guilt. After that, it needs to move on and rebuild a more united Lebanese political scene. This is hard enough to do without the erratic vacillations of this tribunal, which throws up vague hints of accusations here and there.

The tribunal's judges must come to a conclusion.