Top US official Jeffrey Feltman warned on Saturday that ties with Lebanon would be affected if Beirut failed to pay its share of funding to Special Tribunal for Lebanon.

Top US official Jeffrey Feltman warned on Saturday that ties with Lebanon would be affected if Beirut failed to pay its share of funding to Special Tribunal for Lebanon.

"If Lebanon is unable to produce its share of the funding for the Special Tribunal, we're going to have to take some pretty tough decisions, and I think you're going to see some consequences in terms of the US-Lebanese bilateral relationship," Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs said in an interview with Al-Arabiya television in Washington.

"I'd expect the same thing in terms of some other countries as well."

Under the tribunal protocol, Lebanon is responsible for meeting 49 percent of the costs of the STL, which is probing the 2005 assassination of former PM Rafiq Hariri.
However the controversial protocol was signed at a time the cabinet was lacking the real representation of all parties. 

Few months ago, the tribunal issued its indictment in Hariri crime. It had accused four members of Hezbollah for taking role in the murder.

Hezbollah firmly denied the allegation, stressing that the tribunal is aiming at toppling the resistance, the unreachable goal of July war 2006.

The party’s Secretary General Sayed Hasan Nasrallah said it clear: “We will cut off any hand which will arrest any of our Mujahedeen”.