The Registrar of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL), Robin Vincent, has resigned from his position in The Hague.

Mr. Vincent has been registrar of the tribunal that tries the suspected killers of Lebanon's former Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri, since March 2008. He has overseen its establishment and the official opening on 1 March 2009.

Tribunal spokeswoman Suzan Khan said Vincent did not make public the reasons for prematurely ending his three-year contract and was not available for comment.

Vincent had previously worked on several other cases of international prominence, including the Special Tribunal for Sierra Leone and the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia. He has advised on the creation of the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia, the tribunal trying former Khmer Rouge officials.

The tribunal, the world's first anti-terrorist court, was created to try those responsible for Hariri's death in a massive Beirut car bombing in February 2005 along with 22 other people.

Since 1 March 2009, the tribunal's first plenary has been held, the rules of procedure and evidence and other legal documents have been adopted, the court's officials have been sworn-in, and the first submissions and orders have been made.