Defence claims Hariri court has no jurisdiction

The lawyer of accused Hezbollah members in the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri have argued that a United Nations-backed court should not be entitled to hold their trial, as they have no jurisdiction in the case. Hezbollah’s lawyer Antoine Korkmaz said that the assassination was not an international crime. He claimed the four accused should be tried by a Lebanese court, instead of being tried in the Netherlands-based Special Tribunal for Lebanon. The defence lawyers have accused the UN Security Council of abusing their powers when the court was set up five years ago. Defense lawyers have appealed after judges issued a first ruling that the court had the jurisdiction for the trial. Hariri, former Lebanese Prime Minister and a billionaire Sunni Muslim politician, was killed  in February 2005 in a spectacular car bombing in Beirut, along with another 22 people, including the suicide bomber. The lawyer said: "Terrorism is not an international crime for which you can set up an international criminal tribunal” He added that no special tribunal was set up to try those behind the 9/11 attacks. The trial is set to start in March 2013, despite that the defendants are still on the run. Hezbollah has denied any involvement in the attack that killed Hariri and was initially blamed on Syria.