DAMASCUS, Oct. 13 (Xinhuanet) -- Syrian Interior Minister Ghazi Kanaan shot himself in the mouth with his own gun, Damascus chief public prosecutor Mohammed Marwan al-Luwaji said on Thursday.

    According to the official SANA news agency, Luwaji confirmed after forensic examinations and a probe of his office that Kanaan committed suicide on Wednesday by using his own personal revolver.

    "Examination of the body and finger prints as well as testimony from the staff, including senior aide General Walid Abaza, indicated that it was a suicide by gunshot. General Kanaan put the barrel of his gun in his mouth and fired a bullet," Luwaji was quoted as saying.

    The prosecutor said Kanaan arrived at his office at 9:15 a.m. (0715 GMT) on Wednesday, went home at 10:00 a.m. (0800 GMT) and came back to his office shortly afterwards.

    "Five minutes later, his bodyguard heard a muffled gunshot.

    Abaza ran into his office and found Kanaan lying on his back on the office floor. He saw that he (Kanaan) held his personal revolver in his right hand, a finger on the trigger and his hand on his chest," said Luwaji.

    He added that the minister "was still alive (at that time), his breathing was rapid and his body shaken by convulsions ... the minister was immediately taken to Al-Shami hospital in Damascus.

    He was admitted to intensive care where he died after several attempts to revive him."

    Syrian newspapers reported Kanaan's death on their front pages, without venturing any motive for his suicide.

    Kanaan, Syria's former military intelligence chief in Lebanon for two decades from 1982 to 2002, was appointed interior minister last October in a cabinet reshuffle.

    Earlier, some reports from Lebanese media said he showed UN investigators cheques paid to him by former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, who was killed in a powerful car bomb blast in Beirut on Feb. 14. But he denied in an interview with a Lebanese radio station by phone hours before his suicide.

    Kanaan was believed to be among senior Syrian officials inquired last month by Detlev Mehlis, chief UN investigator to probe the assassination of Hariri.

    Kanaan died three weeks after the secret inquiry and days before the release of a UN report on it.

    Earlier this year, the US treasury announced a freeze on Kanaan's assets.

    Last month, the Lebanese Central Bank opened up accounts of Kanaan to UN investigators.

    Kanaan was born in 1942 in the northwestern coastal city of Latakia and had four sons and two daughters. Enditem