The Hague  - Italian judge Antonio Cassese has appointed president of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL), the tribunal that will probe the 2005 assassination of former Lebanese premier Rafik Hariri said in a statement Tuesday.

The United Nations tribunal, which based in the Dutch city of The Hague, also said the other judges had been sworn in but did not release their names because "not all security measures are in place yet."

Cassese previously served as the first president of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) from 1993 to 1997.

In October 2004, he was appointed by then UN secretary general Kofi Annan as chairperson for the International Commission of Inquiry on Darfur.

Of the STL judges, only Cassese and Belgian Daniel Fransen, from the pre-trial chamber, are to function on a full-time basis.

The tribunal said Francois Roux of France has been appointed to head the tribunal's Defence Office.

The Special Tribunal for Lebanon is an international court, established by the UN in 2007 upon Lebanon's request and formally opened in the Netherlands on March 1.

It will try suspects in Hariri's assassination in a car bomb attack in Beirut on February 14, 2005. At the time of his death, Hariri, who had served as prime minister from
1992-1998 and again from 2000-2004, was a member of parliament.

According to its mandate, the tribunal is also authorized to prosecute any terror attack in Lebanon between October 1, 2004 and December 12, 2005 "of a nature and gravity similar to" the attack in which Hariri was killed. (dpa)