The Plot Thickens: Mehlis' Witness No. 1 Exposed?
New TV, a not-so-trustworthy Lebanese satellite channel, aired a tabloid-ish report during its evening news yesterday (Nov. 22) about a man it claims is the first ‘witness’ cited in the Mehlis report (…officially the ‘Report of the International Independent Commission Established Persuant to United Nations Security Council Resolution 1595,’ published on October 21, 2005, see points 96-102 as relates to this witness). Whereas doubts have been cast on the veracity of witness no. 2—a certain ‘Zuhir Ibn Mohamed Said Saddik’—the remaining certainty regarding Syrian culpability in Hariri’s murder hinges solely on the man who became known in media-jargon as ‘the masked witness’; now allegedly identified by New TV as ‘Hosam Taher Hosam.’ (...)
In its news story, New TV broadcast snippets of recorded conversations with Mr. Hosam, in which his account mirrors the information attributed to ‘witness no. 1’ by the Mehlis report, including the ‘expunged’ part identifying the role of Assef Shawkat. New TV claims that he shared most of this information before the Mehlis report was published.
Witness no. 1 and Mr. Hosam claim to be have been in too many critical places, and claim to have witnessed too many incriminating circumstances, to be true by my book. Maybe intelligence plots unfold neatly in Le Carre novels, but the ‘business’ is certainly far too clumsy and capricious in the real world. (...)
Furthermore, New TV suggests in a statement published on its website that Mr. Hosam offered to sell his story for a lot of money, and that he made this offer to them as well as to several other media outlets.
More:
http://talismangate.blogspot.com/2005/11/plot-thickens-mehlis-witness-no-1.html