Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati said on Saturday he had been asked by the president to stay in his post as fear and anger over the assassination of a senior intelligence chief opposed to the Syrian leadership gripped the country.
Mikati told a news conference in the presidential palace that he had offered his resignation to President Michel Suleiman to make way for a government of national unity, but had been asked to remain in office for the time being.
As he spoke, gunmen and demonstrators blocked roads with burning tires in Beirut and other cities to protest against the killing of Brigadier-General Wissam al-Hassan in a car bomb explosion in the center of the capital on Friday afternoon.
Lebanese politicians have accused Syrian President Bashar-al Assad of being behind the attack, deepening fears that Syria’s sectarian-tinged civil war is spreading to its neighbor.
The opposition March 14 bloc had called for the government, which includes ministers from the Shi’ite militant group Hezbollah, which is close to Assad, to step down.
“Today, I am saying more and more that there should be a national consensus government,” Mikati said. “The cabinet will eventually resign, but at the moment we must take a national stance, and I call on the Lebanese to unite together.”
Hassan had led an investigation that implicated Syria and Hezbollah in the assassination of former prime minister Rafik al-Hariri in 2005.
SECTARIAN TENSION
He also helped to uncover a bomb plot that led to the arrest and indictment in August of a pro-Assad former Lebanese minister, an incident that fuelled sectarian enmity in a country where the balance between religious groups is fragile.
Lebanon’s religious communities are divided between those that support Assad in Syria’s civil war and those that back the Sunni-led rebels. Lebanon is still recovering from its own 1975-1990 civil war, and the assassination threatens to bring a new bout of instability and bloodshed.
Squads of armed men gathered in the northern, mostly-Sunni city of Tripoli, where pro- and anti-Assad factions have clashed repeatedly this year.
In Beirut, troops reinforced road junctions and official buildings but many roads, including the highway to the international airport, were blocked by demonstrators.
Soldiers and police guarded street corners in Beirut’s Ashrafiyeh area, the mainly Christian district where the bomb exploded during rush hour, and at Martyrs’ Square in the center.
In the capital’s Sunni Muslim areas, where most people are opposed to the Alawite Assad, cars mounted with loudspeakers cruised the streets issuing calls for the government to resign.
Dozens of gunmen were in the streets and the mood was tense, witnesses said.
Lebanese soldiers opened fire on a group who took over a road in the Bekaa Valley, wounding two people, witnesses said. Rallies were also held the southern town of Sidon.
“HUGE BLOW”
The late Hariri’s son, Saad al-Hariri, accused Syria’s Assad of being behind the bombing, which killed at least eight people and wounded more than 80. Saudi Arabia, a close ally of the late Hariri and opponent of Assad, said the bombing was an attack on Lebanon’s security and stability.
The head of Lebanon’s Internal Security Forces, Major-General Ashraf Rifi, described Hassan’s death as a “huge blow” and warned that further attacks were likely.
“We’ve lost a central security pillar,” he told Future Television. “Without a doubt, we have more sacrifices coming in the future. We know that, but we will not be broken.”
Druze leader Walid Jumblatt, whose party still formally supports Mikati’s government though he is bitterly critical of Assad and Hezbollah, said Hassan’s death left Lebanon unsafe.
“He was our protector. This is a harsh blow but we will not be scared and we should not accuse anyone inside Lebanon so we don’t give Bashar an excuse to seize the country,” he said.
Lebanon’s mufti, the senior Sunni religious figure, announced three days of mourning for Hassan. He will be buried with full honors on Sunday.
Hassan, who had returned to Lebanon on Thursday night from Germany, had helped to uncover many assassination attempts against anti-Syrian figures in Lebanon and had himself escaped several attempts on his life.
Two Syrian officers, including General Ali Mamlouk, the head of Syria’s national security bureau, were indicted along with Lebanon’s former information minister Michel Samaha in August over a plot allegedly aimed at stoking violence in Lebanon.
UNPRECEDENTED
The indictments were an unprecedented move against Syria, a dominant player in Lebanese affairs for decades. Syria sided with different factions during the 1975-1990 civil war and deployed troops in Beirut who stayed until 2005.
As well as being the brains behind the Samaha investigation, Hassan led the investigation into Rafik al-Hariri’s murder seven years ago and uncovered evidence that implicated Syria and Hezbollah, though both deny involvement. An international tribunal accused several Hezbollah members of involvement in the murder.
Despite the accusations from Lebanese politicians, both the Assad government and Hezbollah condemned the bombing. Syria’s information minister called it a “terrorist act”.
The bombing also heightened concern among Western powers – who have strongly criticized Assad and called on him to quit – that the Syrian war could ignite conflict across the region.
More than 30,000 people have been killed in Syria since a Sunni-led popular uprising against Assad, a member of the Shi’ite-linked Alawite sect, broke out 19 months ago.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Hassan’s killing was “a dangerous sign that there are those who continue to seek to undermine Lebanon’s stability”.
Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi, whose country is a powerful backer of Assad and Hezbollah, condemned the bombing and said he planned to visit Beirut.
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