BEIRUT, Lebanon - Reliable sources informed on the investigation in ex-minister Pierre Gemayel's assassination told Naharnet Friday that Ahmed Jibril's Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command played a role in the crime.

The sources said a vehicle used in the assassination, a Honda VRC, was stolen from the mountain resort of Brummana in October 2006 and taken to an area in the northern sector of the eastern Bekaa valley where car bandits operate.

Shortly after that, a member of Jibril's Syrian-backed PFLP-GC approached the gang and bartered the car for a quantity of weapons, the sources added.

The car was used in the Nov. 21 assassination of Gemayel in Suburban Jdaideh, almost a month after it was stolen from Brummana, the sources added.

The vehicle was later driven to Syria, which turned it back to Lebanon in Dec. 2006 in line with a warrant issued by the Interpol, they explained.

One source said lab tests showed that the car was used in the Gemayel assassination and two of the gunmen who used it were killed later in clashes between Lebanese Forces and Fatah al-Islam terrorists in Tripoli's Mitein street on May 20.

Bodies of the gunmen and samples taken from the car were under lab tests to determine identities of all the culprits who gunned down Gemayel, the source added.

He said all details related to the investigation in Gemayel's killing and the Fatah al-Islam link have been relayed to the U.N. committee investigating the 2005 killing of ex-Premier Rafik Hariri and related crimes. -Naharnet