SYRIA - Oct 12 - Top Official In Hariri Inquiry Found Dead.

The interior minister Ghazi Kanaan, one of the top officials questioned in the UN investigation of the assassination of Lebanon's former PM, is found dead in his office in what the authorities describes as a suicide. The death of Ghazi Kanaan, who served as head of Syrian intelligence in Lebanon until 2002, comes days before a UN report is expected to recommend a deeper inquiry into involvement by Damascus in the February killing of Rafiq Hariri, a billionaire businessman who ran Lebanon in the 1990s. Western and Arab diplomats expect the report by UN investigators, to be presented to the Security Council on Oct 21, to point to a Syrian role in the killing but call for another stage of the investigation, focused on Damascus. Diplomats say that if Syria fails to co-operate, it would face political and economic sanctions. Syrian officials said the 63-year-old Kanaan had shot himself in the mouth in his office. His death is the most dramatic sign of political turmoil in Damascus, which has come under unprecedented international pressure since the Hariri killing. The US has ratcheted up the rhetoric against the regime and is apparently hoping the Hariri investigation will encourage a coup that would sweep away Pres Bashar Al Assad. Syria experts cast doubt on the official version of Kanaan's death. Joshua Landis, an American living in Damascus, linked the demise of Kanaan to perceptions that he was seen, particularly by the US, as a potential alternative to Assad. His death, however, also eliminates one of the most important witnesses in the UN inquiry. Some western officials had speculated in recent weeks that Syrian officials who were involved in Lebanon may be found dead as a way of ending the investigation. Assad last night insisted Syria was innocent. He told CNN that if any officials were implicated in the Hariri murder they would be punished. Syrian state-run newspapers have launched a campaign in recent days to discredit Lebanese officials and Detlev Mehlis, the German prosecutor heading the UN team. Damascus also says it has fully co-operated with the investigation. But diplomats close to the investigation say access in Syria was severely restricted when Mehlis's team visited last month. Investigators interviewed Kanaan and Rustom Ghazale, his successor as head of intelligence in Lebanon, but UN requests for meetings with Pres Assad and his brother Maher were denied. Kanaan's death comes a day after New TV, a Lebanese TV station, claimed he had told UN investigators of his involvement in extortion and corruption when he served in Lebanon. Just hours before his death Kanaan gave an interview to a Lebanese radio station to deny the report. He also said: I think this is the last statement I might give".