They have singled Lahoud out as the main pro-Syrian holdover and highest ranking politician responsible for the security system still in place.

Following a Tuesday night meeting, opposition members said Hawi’s assassination was part of a ‘terrorist’ sequence of events that began last September with the extension of Lahoud’s six-year presidential mandate by another three years.

That extension was largely seen as imposed by Syria in violation of a UN Security Council resolution that called for presidential elections to be held and for Syria to remove its troops from Lebanon.

Hariri’s assassination triggered street protests and international anger that forced a Syrian troop pullout in April and increased calls on the president to step down.

“This series of events, whose first chapter began by extending the mandate of the president, the real president of the security and intelligence regime, will not end before all the effects of the extension are removed,” the opposition said in a statement after meeting.

They called for “the highest possible turnout” for Hawi’s funeral on Friday, and a general strike that day.

Opposition leader Walid Jumblatt also called for Lahoud’s removal and a purge of security agencies.