DAMASCUS (AFP) -- Syria's president ruled out on Thursday any cooperation with an international court to try suspects for the 2005 murder of former Lebanese premier Rafiq Hariri if it threatens his country's sovereignty.

"We consider that the international tribunal concerns only Lebanon and the United Nations and that we are not directly concerned," Bashar al-Assad said in a speech to parliament. "Any cooperation requested from Syria which could compromise our national sovereignty is rejected."

Syria, which has been implicated in a UN probe over the Hariri assassination despite its repeated denials, is opposed to plans for the court which have been endorsed by the UN Security Council.

"Syria is cooperating with the commission but not with the tribunal. There is a difference between cooperation and abandoning our independence," Assad told parliament. "We have cooperated with the international commission of inquiry and we reiterate our readiness to cooperate it as long as it respect our laws and our sovereignty."

Hariri, who had become a critic of Damascus, and 22 other people were killed in a massive bomb blast in February 2005. An international outcry that followed forced Damascus only two months later to end nearly 30 years of military and political domination of its smaller neighbor.

The United Nations set up a commission to probe the killing, and the panel's first interim report implicated top-level Syrian figures and their Lebanese accomplices in Hariri's assassination.

Syrians could presumably be called as witnesses by the tribunal, if not even indicted on charges of murder, or conspiracy.

Assad was speaking before a session of parliament, which unanimously endorsed his candidacy for a new term in office and which must now fix a date for a referendum.

The president, who succeeded his late father Hafez in 2000, also played down the prospects for Middle East peace, saying Israel's weakened cabinet was not ready and Washington had abandoned its role as honest broker.

Washington accuses the Syrian regime of allowing anti-U.S. insurgents to cross from Syria into Iraq and of supporting terrorist groups in Lebanon and in the Palestinian territories. Syria denies the accusations.

The United Nations and Lebanon's anti-Syrian government signed a deal last year to set up the court, which would be made up of both Lebanese and foreign judges and which would be based outside the country.

The accord must be ratified by the country's parliament, but its pro-Syrian speaker, Nabih Berri, has refused to convene lawmakers for a vote.

The anti-Damascus parliamentary majority accuses the opposition of trying to protect Syria.

The latest in a string of political crises since the Hariri murder mushroomed last November when six pro-Syrian ministers resigned from the government of Prime Minister Fuad Siniora in disagreement over the nature of the tribunal.

The top UN legal adviser, Nicolas Michel, traveled to Beirut last month in a failed bid to broker a compromise and, in early May, key members of the UN Security Council indicated that they could soon act to break the deadlock over the tribunal.