Prime Minister Najib Miqati denied on Thursday that he has vowed to resign if the cabinet failed to fund the Special Tribunal for Lebanon.

The denial came after al-Liwaa daily said Miqati has stressed he would submit his resignation if his allies in the cabinet Hizbullah, AMAL and the Free Patriotic Movement were not convinced of the importance of funding the STL.

Kaoru Okuizumi was sworn in Wednesday as deputy registrar for the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, announced the tribunal in a statement.

Okuizumi, a Japanese national, has extensive background in international criminal justice and human rights, it said.

Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat is seeking to revive the “Democratic Gathering,” al-Liwaa newspaper reported on Wednesday.

“He is paving way to meet with ex-Prime Minister Saad Hariri,” sources told the daily.

Naharnet Exclusive Report – Leidschendam:

The pace of work at the Office of the Prosecutor of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon appears to be dynamic, coherent and organized despite Prosecutor Daniel Bellemare’s absence from Leidschendam over the past few weeks due to health problems.

France is keen that Lebanon state its clear position on the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, whether it is positive or negative, revealed French diplomatic sources to the daily al-Mustaqbal Sunday.

They added that the ties between the two countries will remain the same until Lebanon reveals its stance on the tribunal.

Al-Mustaqbal bloc leader Fouad Saniora on Saturday snapped back at Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah over his accusations that the former PM guaranteed a way out for the U.S. after it rejected to fund the United Nations cultural agency UNESCO.

Following closed-door talks with Premier Najib Miqati on the sidelines of the Dar al-Fatwa meeting, Saniora said: “Linking the funding of UNESCO and the international tribunal is inappropriate because the issue of the court has to do with Lebanon’s commitment and cooperation with it.”

Leidschendam, Naharnet Exclusive:

The arguments of the representative of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon Prosecutor, lawyer Lain Morley, during a hearing on Friday unveiled that the prosecution’s strategy at this stage lies on delaying in absentia trials in ex-Premier Rafik Hariri’s assassination case for a period of three months for several reasons.

Naharnet Exclusive Report – Leidschendam:

The arguments of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon’s Defense Office, voiced on Friday by office chief Francois Roux and his deputy, lawyer Alia Aoun, intersected with the information published Thursday by Naharnet about the presence of disputes among the defense counsels on how to deal with the STL.

The Special Tribunal for Lebanon Victims’ Participation Unit stressed on Friday that the trial of the suspects in the assassination of former Premier Rafik Hariri should not start without the participation of the victims who were affected in the crime.

A representative of the unit said during an STL court hearing in The Hague that the trials cannot begin without the victims, saying that there are several victims who are waiting for the tribunal to extend its hands and help them.

The head of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon Defense Office Francois Roux demanded on Friday that the arrest warrants against the four accused in the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri be eliminated.

He said during a hearing at the STL headquarters in The Hague: “The issuance of arrest warrants has led to the accused being unable or unwilling to appear freely here in accordance with the provisions of the STL’s Rules of Evidence and Procedure.”