A Syrian foreign ministry legal adviser will meet in Spain the head of a UN team investigating the killing of Rafiq al-Hariri, says an official source.

The UN team's chief Detlev Mehlis had wanted to question six Syrian officials in Lebanon as part of his probe into the 14 February assassination of the former Lebanese prime minister.

"The talks between (Riad) al-Daoudi and Mehlis will tackle Syria's proposal that he (Mehlis) questions Syrian officials at UN offices in the Golan Heights," the source said on Friday.

Daoudi will also discuss Syria's proposal on legal cooperation with the UN investigation committee "among other aspects", the source said without giving further details.

Daoudi held unofficial consultations on 9 November with Mehlis, who then rejected a proposal that the meetings take place at the Arab League headquarters in Cairo.

The offices of United Nations Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF) are on Syrian soil in a buffer zone on the Golan Heights and were set up after the 1973 Arab-Israeli war to maintain the ceasefire between Israel and Syria.

The offices at Camp Faouar are not in parts controlled by Israel, which occupied the heights in 1967. The buffer zone is off limits to the armed forces of both sides.

Syrian concerns

Syria has said Mehlis had been made aware of Syria's reservations about Beirut as a venue citing fears of tensions between the neighbours.

Anti-Syrian sentiment is still running high in Lebanon where many people say Damascus and its Lebanese allies were behind the attack. Syria retains the support of some political groups in Lebanon, especially the Shia Amal and Hizb Allah factions.

In an interim report last month, Mehlis said he had evidence of Syrian and Lebanese officials' involvement in al-Hariri's assassination by a car bomb that also killed 22 others. Syria denies any role in the killing of its former long-term ally.

PHOTO CAPTION

German prosecutor Detlev Mehlis holds a press conference in the Lebanese resort of Brummana, in the hills east of Beirut, September 2005. (AFP)