UNITED NATIONS – A U.N. fact-finding mission accused Syria yesterday of creating the conditions for the assassination of Rafik Hariri, but stopped short of concluding that Damascus actually carried out the February 14 car bombing that killed Hariri and started the Cedar Revolution.

The deputy police commissioner of Ireland, Peter Fitzgerald, who led the fact-finding mission, said in his report that no conclusive investigation could be conducted as long as the current Syrian-controlled Lebanese authorities run the country.

While Syrian officials immediately accused Mr. Fitzgerald of being biased and overly political, several council members suggested launching a more comprehensive international investigation. If that happens, Syria could face more pressure.

“The government of Syria bears primary responsibility for the political tension that preceded” the Hariri assassination, the Fitzgerald report concluded. Its military intelligence is responsible for the “lack of security, protection, law, and order” in the country. “Syria clearly exerted influence that goes beyond the reasonable exercise of cooperative or neighborly relations.”

The Syrian ambassador, Fayssal Mekdad, said, “It’s regrettable that such allegations found themselves into the report.” He also accused the Security Council itself of creating the climate that led to the assassination. “What caused the division in Lebanon,” he said, “is Resolution 1559.” That resolution called for Syrian troops to withdraw from Lebanon.

Mr. Mekdad objected to the description of a meeting between Hariri and President Assad, in which the report said the Syrian president threatened Hariri and the Druze leader Walid Jumbalat “with physical harm” if they do not agree to the extension of the Syrian-favored Lebanese president Emile Lahoud’s term in office.

Mr. Fitzgerald, the Syrian ambassador insisted yesterday, was listening only to the anti-Syrian forces in Lebanon while ignoring the other side. “There’s too much rhetoric,” in the report, Mr. Mekdad argued. Mr. Fitzgerald “has taken one side against the other.”

The Fitzgerald report noted that the Lebanese authorities carried out their own investigation, but concluded that it “was not carried out in accordance with acceptable international standards,” and “lacks the confidence of the population, necessary for its results to be accepted.”

Several members of the security council started discussing the possibility of a new resolution yesterday to create an independent investigation. “I expect the council to support the idea,” said the British ambassador Emyr Jones Parry. “The United Kingdom would certainly support that.”

However, some resistance is expected. “We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it,” said Algeria’s ambassador, Abdallah Baali, who is the only Arab representative on the council. Mr. Mekdad insisted a Lebanese investigation would be credible and said there should be no outside interference.

On a separate issue, the council passed an American-sponsored resolution yesterday that authorized 10,000 African Union troops to monitor a cease-fire agreement between Sudan’s government and rebels in the southern part of the country.

This was only one of several resolutions the Americans had prepared in order to address the situation in Sudan. However, it did not directly address the situation in the western region of Darfur, where the Bush administration described the killing of up to 400,000 civilians as “genocide.”

France yesterday postponed a vote on its own proposed resolution, largely seen as intended to confront Washington, to try war criminals in Darfur at the Hague-based International Criminal Court. The Bush administration, which strongly opposes the ICC, was expected to veto the resolution, opening the door to a new impasse at the council.

France pulled its proposal, which it had intended to bring to a vote yesterday, after realizing none of the ICC supporters on the council agreed to co-sponsor it. “I’m sure there will be other co-sponsors,” the French ambassador, Jean Marc de la Sabliere, told The New York Sun yesterday.

America intends to bring to a vote at least two other proposals on Darfur soon, which would threaten the Khartoum government with sanctions, establish a no-fly zone over Darfur, and create an African-led tribunal to try criminals instead of the ICC. China and Russia, both of whom have veto power in the council, oppose any sanctions against Sudan.