Syria’s interior minister, Ghazi Kanaan—who was recently questioned by UN investigators over the assassination of Lebanon’s former prime minister—has been found shot dead in his office. President Bashar Assad may consider his minister’s “suicide” as rather convenient, though in fact it could serve to weaken his regime

AFP

Kanaan (left) had been Assad's man in Lebanon

SUICIDE is an oddly common exit for top Syrian officials. Five years ago, a recently disgraced prime minister, Mahmoud al-Zubi, managed to shoot himself, repeatedly, while under house arrest. Now the country's interior minister, Ghazi Kanaan, has met a similar fate. This latest death, however, is far more significant.

On Wednesday October 12th, Syria announced that Mr Kanaan had been found dead in his office, having supposedly shot himself in the mouth. His death was disclosed only hours after he telephoned a Lebanese radio station to deny rumours about information he is said to have passed to United Nations investigators. They had recently questioned him and other Syrian security officials over the assassination of Rafik Hariri, a former prime minister of Lebanon who had opposed Syria's military and political domination of his country.

Mr Kanaan ended his radio interview by saying: “I think this may be the last statement I give.” Almost simultaneously, Mr Assad was giving an interview to America's CNN television, repeating his denials that he or his regime had anything to do with Hariri's murder. More intriguingly still, in another recent interview, the Syrian president said that if anyone in his government were found to have “acted alone”, this would be considered as treason, punishable by death.

Mr Kanaan was both a ruthlessly seasoned intelligence operator and a member of the Alawite minority that dominates Syria's power elite (and to which Mr Assad belongs). For 20 years until 2002, Mr Kanaan virtually ruled Lebanon in his capacity as Syria's proconsul in the neighbouring state. A master manipulator of Lebanon's viciously contesting factions, he systematically bled Syria's enemies before helping to seal the accord in 1989 that ended Lebanon's 15 years of civil war and ensconced Syria as Lebanon's final arbiter. The ensuing peace, enforced by a security establishment that reported directly to Mr Kanaan, richly rewarded his friends, top Syrian generals and pro-Syrian Lebanese politicians alike.

Brought back to Damascus as head of the Political Security Directorate three years ago, before becoming interior minister in October 2004, Mr Kanaan was a pillar of the regime. But his apparent removal from direct oversight of Lebanon boded poorly for Syria's fortunes. Growing Lebanese resentment of Syrian tutelage erupted after the killing, in February, of Hariri, which many Lebanese instinctively blamed on Syria. International opprobrium forced Syria to pull out its troops and undermined the patronage network created by Mr Kanaan, such that the Lebanese elections this summer produced a determinedly anti-Syrian government.

More damaging yet, the UN's investigation into Hariri's murder fingered the Lebanese security chiefs that Mr Kanaan had put in place, several of whom were arrested. Last month, the UN's chief investigator, Detlev Mehlis, pressed his inquiries still closer. Bowing to intense diplomatic pressure, Mr Assad let him question senior intelligence officials, including Mr Kanaan and his successor in Lebanon until the Syrian withdrawal, Rustum Ghazale. In the radio interview he gave minutes before his death, Mr Kanaan denied rumours reported in Lebanese media that he had handed the UN investigators extensive files on corruption in Lebanon during his tenure and had shown them photocopies of cheques he had received from Hariri.

As yet, the outcome of the UN team's interrogations remains unknown. Mr Mehlis is due to report to the UN Security Council within days. Speculation has mounted, however, as to how Mr Assad's fragile regime may respond if it is implicated in Hariri's murder and told to surrender officials for trial. Because Damascus is diplomatically isolated, and squeezed militarily between Israel and America's forces in Iraq, Mr Assad may have concluded that it would be wise to offer a scapegoat. Was that Mr Kanaan?

Even if the UN sleuths' trail of clues stops at the door of Mr Kanaan, that may not get Mr Assad off the hook. The loss of such a stalwart figure in his wobbly regime seems likely to weaken it further, especially if Mr Kanaan's allies find it hard to swallow the official line that his death was suicide. The president, his clan and the ruling Baath party face a crisis as grave as any since his father, Hafez Assad, consolidated Syria's dictatorship 35 years ago. Where once it could rely on support from the Soviet Union and pan-Arab solidarity, Syria now has few friends in the world except Iran. America is annoyed at Syria's suspected abetting of Iraqi insurgents and at the support it offers other groups America regards as terrorists. America's ambassador in Iraq recently spoke darkly of “all options” being open regarding how Syria might be punished.

Should the Security Council be presented with proof of the Assad regime's complicity—or worse—in the Hariri assassination, and should Damascus fail to hand over suspects for trial, Mr Assad's government is sure to be punished by further isolation, and an internationalisation of sanctions that are now unilaterally imposed by America. These would serve only to intensify the unrest that has been building in Syria at such ills as corruption and high unemployment. Whether the regime would react to such pressures by reforming, lashing out or collapsing (if not overthrown) is hard to predict.