The media in the coming week will undoubtedly focus on the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) in The Hague, in light of the testimony of Lebanese political figures as witnesses, and more importantly the insinuation of a link between the defendant’s cellphone lines and senior Syrian officials, whose names, according to Lebanese Interior Minister Nohad Mashnouk, may include Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
The lawyers of the five defendants who are being prosecuted by the international tribunal in absentia — after the Lebanese and international authorities failed to find them and bring them before the special tribunal, which was established under UN Security Council Resolution 1757 on May 30, 2007 — anticipate a correlation between the expected testimonies and the cellphone line links.