A blistering attack on Bashar Assad was delivered by one of his closest aides, ex-vice president Khalim Haddam, over al Arabia TV Friday, Dec. 30
December 30, 2005, 9:08 PM (GMT+02:00)
He denounced the Syrian president for spurning his advice to sack General Rustoum Ghazaleh, the former Syrian military intelligence in Lebanon, immediately after the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri last February.
DEBKAfile’s Middle East sources note that Haddam insinuated in the interview that Assad had had pre-knowledge of the murder and could have prevented it. He clearly laid the crime at Ghazaleh’s door and made it clear that the general would not have acted without Assad’s authority. This veteran Syrian politician’s diatribe against Assad is unprecedented and shocked opinion in Damascus and the Arab world.