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March 14 points finger at Tehran, Damascus
BEIRUT: The March 14 Forces accused Damascus and Tehran on Sunday of planning to topple the legitimate authorities in Lebanon and re-establish Syrian hegemony over the country.

In response to the resignations of the five Shiite ministers from Premier Fouad Siniora's government, the coalition met late Sunday at the Qoreitem home of the parliamentary majority leader, MP Saad Hariri, to form a unified stance. Afterward, Hariri read out a statement in which he accused Syria and Iran of being behind the resignations and plotting to foil the international tribunal to try those accused of killing his father, former Premier Rafik Hariri.

Hizbullah and Amal ministers resigned Saturday after accusing the March 14 Forces of "controlling the decision-making in the Cabinet" - and on the eve of a planned session to pass the final draft of the court.

The ministers who resigned are Labor Minister Trad Hamadeh, Agriculture Minister Talal Sahili, Foreign Minister Fawzi Salloukh, Health Minister Mohammed Jawad Khalifeh, and Energy and Water Minister Mohammed Fneish.

"This resignation ... was not a coincidence. The March 14 Forces lament this step and see in it an attempt to foil the formation of the international tribunal," Hariri said. "We agreed twice to Speaker Nabih Berri's call for dialogue and consultations to maintain stability ... but it turned out that some parties didn't want this and their hidden intentions became clear to us ... It is a Syrian-Iranian plot to topple legitimate rule in Lebanon, destroy the Paris III donor conference, annul the tribunal and place this country back under the former [Syrian] mandate."

He added that "this plan was done by the Syrian regime and the [pro-Syrian] president [Emile Lahoud] ... who wants to assassinate Rafik Hariri a second time."

"Foiling this tribunal and protecting the criminals [bears the fingerprints] of a well-known murderous regime," he added, "which we will not allow to succeed."

Hizbullah and Amal rejected linking the resignation of their ministers with the idea of an attempt to halt the tribunal. "Our stance on the tribunal is clear," Amal MP Ali Hassan Khalil told The Daily Star on Sunday. "We have nothing to hide and we have said so in the dialogue and consultations. In principle we agree on the tribunal and we have made it clear in our statements."

However, when the tribunal was first discussed after anti-Syrian MP Gebran Tueni was assassinated in late 2005, the same Shiite ministers suspended their participation in the Cabinet. "We are in direct contact with our allies to assess the situation," Khalil added. "All options are being considered, and our resignation was for political reasons as there is domination over power and decision-making. When these reasons are taken into consideration by the majority and we reach an agreement on that, then maybe we will return to the Cabinet."

As to whether the Amal and Hizbullah blocs would resign from Parliament, a prominent Hizbullah official told The Daily Star on condition of anonymity: "There are many means of pressure that we can use, but resigning from the Parliament isn't one of them."

Street protests are one option that hizbullah has stressed. Hizbullah's number two, Sheikh Naim Qassem, told Reuters on Sunday that the Cabinet resignation "was a first step. There will be other steps that we will discuss in detail with our allies and which we will announce gradually."

"Going ... to the streets is one of the important steps that Hizbullah and its allies will take," he added.

Also Sunday, Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmad Abou al-Gheit argued that "efforts must be exerted to avoid, by all means, resorting to the street."

The resignation came as a surprise to many, despite the "electrified" nature of Saturday's consultation session. A governmental source told The Daily Star that the session was tense and "electrified so it had to be postponed until Wednesday until Berri returns from his trip to Tehran."

Speaking from Iran after meeting Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki on the sidelines of a convention of Asian legislative leaders, Berri said the "situation ... has reached a divorce status, but this doesn't mean we have hit a dead end. Divorce can be revocable but this is in the hands of the majority." He added that "I tried to find a remedy to the problem, but alas, we reached a point where divorce was inevitable."
Deutsche Welle reported today on two further developments: 1) A sixth Lebanese cabinet member has resigned. 2) The Siniora cabinet met and approved the UN framework for the Hariri international tribunal.
Posted by: mrp 2006-11-13
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=171876