| Followup on Steve's post from yesterday. |
BEIRUT - Opposition figures urged Lebanese to join what they called an independence uprising against Syria's grip on Lebanon on Friday, escalating a war of words after former Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri's assassination.
Lebanese Tourism Minister Farid al-Khazen resigned in another sign of the country's political turbulence, and Syrian President Bashar al-Assad named his brother-in-law, Major-General Asef Shawkat, as head of military intelligence to replace retiring Major-General Hassan Khalil.
| Tighting up the loyal inner circle. |
Khazen, a Maronite Christian, became the first minister to quit because of the assassination and said he had done so because the Syrian-backed government was unable to "remedy the dangerous situation in the country". "There is no substitute for national dialogue on the basis of the Taif agreement," he said, referring to the deal that ended a 1975-1990 civil war and committed Syria to moving the troops it keeps in Lebanon to the eastern Bekaa Valley.
Druze leader Walid Jumblatt and figures from the disparate opposition movement blamed the government and its Syrian backers for Hariri's death and called for its resignation. They urged Lebanese to back a peaceful "independence uprising" -- the first time they had used the term. It was not immediately clear what form of protest the uprising would take.
Parliament must also suspend all debate unrelated to the assassination, they told a news conference, until the truth about who killed Hariri emerged. "All the Lebanese are with Hariri, a free Lebanon and Syrian withdrawal," Jumblatt told reporters earlier. Hariri moved towards a similar position in the months before his death.
Lebanese of all religious beliefs have flocked to Hariri's grave to bring flowers and light candles since his funeral on Wednesday turned into a mass anti-Syrian street protest. Several hundred people marched towards the grave on Friday evening shouting independence slogans.
| This is getting serious. The Djinn's outta the bottle. |
Financial markets were busy but mostly stable on their first trading day since Hariri's death, despite tension and US President George W. Bush's latest demand for Syria to pull out its 14,000 troops. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said the United States wanted to force Syria to change its policies, which would help remove the threat of further sanctions. "We are not trying to isolate Syria, what we are trying to do is to get Syria to engage in more responsible behaviour," Rice told reporters in Washington.
The United Nations said it had chosen an Irish deputy police commissioner, Peter Fitzgerald, to lead a UN team that is to report on the "circumstances, causes and consequences" of Hariri's assassination.
Officials said President Emile Lahoud had finally gone to pay condolences to Hariri's relatives, who had refused to let him attend Wednesday's funeral. He told them he would do all he could to find the killers, a statement from his office said.
| He's hiring O.J. to find them, what else can he do? |
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