An international tribunal investigating the assassination of Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri has repeatedly asked for US help in the probe, US diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks and published Thursday in Lebanese media showed.
Tensions are already running high in the country as reports circulate that the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) is soon to issue an indictment for the 2005 murder and that it will accuse members of Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, dpa reported.
The cables detailed repeated appeals from UN investigators for US assistance.
One of the cables quoted the general prosecutor of the STL, Daniel Bellemare, as asking then US ambassador to Lebanon Michele Sison for information on Syria.
In a separate cable, Bellemare was quoted as requesting two US analysts whose salaries, along with others, would be paid for by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation.
A Hezbollah source commenting on the cables, said "the leaks prove that the movement was always right in saying the tribunal was politicized and that the United States is manipulating the probe."
The source, who asked not to be named, went on to say that the leaks should "tell the Lebanese officials who are still defending the work of the tribunal something about its work and how things are done in the Hague."
Hezbollah Secretary General Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah has said that Hezbollah will "cut off the hand" of anyone who tries to arrest any of its members in the case.
Meanwhile, at the STL's headquarters in the Hague, the tribunal's registrar Herman von Hebel on Thursday told a group of reporters that he expected the court's prosecutor to file his first indictment "very, very soon."
Von Hebel gave no more details about the timing or content of the indictment, which will remain confidential until it is confirmed by an STL judge, likely to be early in 2011.
He said that a trial could take place around four to six months after an indictment is confirmed, a process that could take six to 10 weeks.
The court has remained silent about possible suspects, but several reports in the foreign press have said the STL has evidence that Hezbollah members were behind Hariri's assassination.
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