Anger in cities of Tripoli and Saida and other Lebanese cities as Hezbollah-backed Mikati named PM

 

 

Angry Hariri supporters and protesters remove a poster of former premier Najib Mikati in the northern port city of Tripoli, Lebanon, Tuesday, Jan. 25, 2011. Thousands

 

 

Soldiers advance towards stone-throwing PM Hariri supporters of outgoing premier Saad al-Hariri, near Tariq al-Jadidah in Beirut

PM Najib Mikati won 68 votes out of the parliament’s 128 seats to achieve the required parliamentary majority he needed to become Lebanon’s new prime minister.   President Michel Suleiman asked the billionaire Sunni tycoon to form a government amid a "day of rage" by fellow Sunnis who blocked roads and burned tyres in anger at his nomination,  Mikati shortly after his appointment rejected attempts to cast him as "Hezbollah’s man" and said he would cooperate with all Lebanese in a bid to form an inclusive government. "Don’t prejudge me or my behaviour, please, especially the international community," the 55-year-old billionaire businessman told AFP in an interview at his Beirut home where well-wishers gathered to congratulate him.

"I say in all honesty that my nomination by Hezbollah does not mean I am bound by any of their political positions, except as concerns the protection of the national resistance," he said, referring to the Shiite militant group’s struggle against neighbouring Israel. "I will cooperate fully with all Lebanese to form a new government that protects their unity and sovereignty," he said. "My hand is extended to all Lebanese."

Mikati told AFP that he would seek to address the thorny issue through dialogue. "Stopping the tribunal today is no longer a Lebanese decision," he said, adding that Lebanon’s cooperation with the tribunal was another question altogether.

The win came two days after the discussions held between lawmakers and Sleiman and almost two weeks after the collapse of Hariri’s cabinet due to resignation of 11 opposition ministers.  The collective resignation was in protest at a potential move by the US-backed Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) to issue an indictment against Hezbollah. 

Protests had turned violent in the northern Sunni bastion of Tripoli, where frenzied demonstrators torched an Al-Jazeera van and ransacked offices of a local Sunni lawmaker who backed Mikati. Mikati’s appointment has angered Sunnis who see it as a bid by the Iran- and Syria-backed Hezbollah to sideline outgoing premier Saad Hariri and impose its will in Lebanon. Lebanese Armed Forces on Friday deployed its troops in all regions of the country, in a bid to maintain security amid the crisis raised by a UN-backed probing of former Prime Minister Rafic Hariri’s murder case. In a statement issued Friday, The Lebanese Army Guidance Directorate said that within the context of preserving peace and calm throughout the country, the army will adopt security measures such as setting mobile and fixed military checkpoints and regular patrol in different region.

Please click read more for more detail and more Pictures of these unfortunate events – We just want peace and democracy:

From left, Lebanese Ministers Ali Abdallah, Mohammed Fneish, Abraham Dedeyan, Hussein Hajj Hassan, Jibran Bassil, Mohammed Jawad Khalife, Fady Abboud, Charbel Nahhas, Youssef Saade and Ali Shami hold a press conference to announce their resignation in the northern Beirut suburb of Rabieh, Lebanon, Wednesday, Jan. 12, 2011. Lebanon’s government collapsed After this press conference a Minister from the coalition of President Suleiman  minister Adnan Sayyed Hussein  presented its resignation too which conclude 11 ministers resigning 1/3 of the government. Hence the government collapse

Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri (L) meets with US President Barack Obama Wednesday at the moment that Hezbollah and its allies resigned from the Lebanese government, according to an AFP photographer. The two men were meeting in the Oval Office at the White House, smiling as they posed for photographers, without making any statements. (Nader Hariri was in company with PM Hariri

Lebanese opposition Ministers : Gebran Bassil (C), Lebanon’s Minister of Energy and Water and allied to Hezbollah, announces a resignation statement as Mohammad Khalifeh (R), Minister of Health, and Hussein Haj Hassan, Minister of Agriculture, listen during a news conference in Rabieh, near Beirut, January 12, 2011. Lebanese minister Adnan Sayyed Hussein resigned on Wednesday, the state news agency said, bringing to 11 the number of ministerial resignations and effectively collapsing the government of Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri

A Lebanese official says Hezbollah ministers and FPM (Free Patriotic Movement) leaded by MP General Aoun and Marada Party leaded by Frangieh allies have resigned from the Cabinet, bringing the government to the brink of collapse.

 Energy Minister Jibran Bassil told a news conference Wednesday that 10 ministers are pulling out. They need just one more minister to resign in order to force the government to fall and an 11th minister could resign later in the day.

The ministers are stepping down from the 30-member Cabinet over tensions stemming from a U.N.-backed tribunal investigating the assassination of a Former Prime Minister Rafik Harir

resignation of eleven ministers including a minister that represent President Michel Suleiman  that reresent  from the government’s unity coalition Wednesday, which would topple the government and raise concerns of new protests and paralysis in Lebanon.

The Daily Star of Lebanon reports that the resignations, which were to be announced this afternoon local time, were due to Hezbollah and its allies being rabuffed in their demands for an emergency cabinet meeting Tuesday to discuss Lebanese cooperation in the United Nation’s Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL). The STL is investigating the 2005 assassination of Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, father of current Prime Minister Saad Hariri, who has refused to end Lebanese participation in the US-backed tribunal. Several Hezbollah members are expected to be indicted by the tribunal for involvement in the assassination.

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama and Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri on Wednesday reaffirmed their commitment to strengthening Lebanon’s sovereignty and independence even as Hezbollah ministers forced the year-old unity government to collapse.

Hariri made no public comment after the Oval Office visit and immediately departed for France to consult with President Nicolas Sarkozy before returning to Beirut, according to a Lebanese official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomatic moves

A White House statement issued after the meeting said Obama had commended Hariri for his "steadfast leadership and efforts to reach peace, stability and consensus in Lebanon under difficult circumstances."

A source told the Daily Star that Hezbollah and Free Patriotic movement sought the emergency cabinet meeting "to stop payment of Lebanon’s share toward the financing of the S.T.L., withdraw the Lebanese judges from the tribunal, end Lebanon’s cooperation with the S.T.L., and prosecute the ‘false witnesses’ linked to the U.N. probe into Rafik Hariri’s killing…" They warned that failure to hold the meeting would result in the mass resignations of its cabinet members, bringing down the government.

حاوره: فؤاد دعبول وايوب خداج
تقويم الصفحات الاخيرة، من العام الماضي، كان مع النائب في كتلة التغيير والاصلاح الدكتور فريد الخازن، ناقش الاحداث بتداعياتها والوقائع باسلوب سياسي، وبفكر جامعي وثقافة سياسية.
في نقاشه لملف الأحداث، يرى الدكتور فريد الخازن ان الازمة الآن مرتبطة بالمحكمة الدولية وتداعياتها من جهة، وبالوضع السياسي القائم حالياً، خصوصاً قضية شهود الزور.
ويشدد على وجود قضايا طارئة ولا نقوم بها. امامنا موضوع مطروح يتعلق بترسيم الحدود البحرية بيننا وبين اسرائيل، لان هناك نفطاً وغازاً في قلب البحر، وموضوع يتعلق بكيفية ادارة الشؤون المالية للدولة.

ويدعو الدكتور الخازن الى اداء سياسي مختلف ووضع حد للهدر، وتحسين الادارة اللبنانية.
ويحث على انشاء السلطة القضائية المستقلة، وهذا هو مفتاح حل المشاكل الطائفية السياسية، لأنهم يتحولون الى طوائفهم، لعدم ثقتهم بالدولة والقانون، لانه عندما يطبق القانون ويأخذ القضاء دوره باستقلالية عن السياسيين، تنخفض نسبة الطائفية واحتماء الاشخاص بزعماء طوائفهم.
واعرب عن امله بمخرج للازمة المتعلقة بالمحكمة الدولية، وان كانت مضامينها غير معروفة، واعتقد اننا سنصل الى تسوية تجنبنا اي انعكاس سلبي على الوضع العام. وهذه هي وقائع الحديث:

نحن في مطلع عام جديد، هل تتوقعون ان يكون عام ازدهار وخير على لبنان ام عام مشاكل يعجز عن حلها؟

– لا يزال لبنان يواجه عدداً من الملفات المأزومة ولم يتعاف بشكل كامل من سنوات الحرب الماضية، ومن مرحلة ما يُسمى بالوصاية، ولا نزال نبحث لايجاد نقطة توازن في النظام السياسي وعمله. علماً انه منذ العام ٢٠٠٥ ولغاية ٢٠٠٨، مر لبنان بأزمات سياسية. وهذا النظام السياسي اللبناني لم يكن قادراً على التعامل مع المرحلة الانتقالية التي جرت بشكل سريع وغير مسبوق في العام ٢٠٠٥. واعني هنا بالتطورات الكبيرة كاغتيال الرئيس رفيق الحريري، وانسحاب الجيش السوري، وانتفاضة الاستقلال والتحول الكبير في العلاقات الاميركية – السورية والتحول السياسي الدولي تجاه لبنان. هذه كلها حصلت في فترة زمنية لا تتجاوز ٩٠ يوماً.

Minty Clinch, As the Lebanese ski mostly at weekends, the agenda makes a lot of sense. From Sunday to Thursday, visitors have the slopes to themselves. On Fridays and Saturdays, they can watch the locals flaunt their cutting-edge designer clothes on the slopes. Frequent direct flights from Abu Dhabi take just two-and-a-half hours, and Beirut’s city-centre airport makes for short transfers, so Lebanon is a highly practical alternative to a short break in the Alps.

Although it’s a tiny country, Lebanon punches way above its weight in many areas, not least the spectacular Roman ruins at Baalbek, the ancient port at Byblos and the impressive grottos at Jeita. Geographically, it has parallel mountain ranges with the fertile Bekaa Valley – home to what it claims are the world’s oldest vineyards – in between. The Cedars and Mzaar, the two resorts with international appeal, and half a dozen local hills are scattered along the western coastal range overlooking the Mediterranean.

The French introduced skiing in Cedars, in the north of the country towards the Syrian border, during the mandate years in the last century. From the mid-1920s, they rode up the mountain on donkeys, accompanied by villagers carrying their skis. During the Second World War, British soldiers on leave from North Africa headed to Beirut by train, rented leather boots and long hickory skis and hitch-hiked the 130 kilometres to Cedars to flounder up and down the hillside as best they could.

The base station is at 2,000m and the pioneering chairlifts which were installed in 1953 are still running today, backed up in 2005 by some triple chairs that only operate when there are enough customers to justify the expenditure on electricity. The iconic cedar trees, the emblem on the national flag, are conspicuously absent in the large bowl that makes up the ski zone. I’d imagined from old photographs that I’d be weaving my way among them in knee-deep powder. Wrong on both counts.

here is a small plantation of mini cedars at the bottom of the resort next to a longish street of stalls selling cedar memorabilia. The trees are supposedly protected, but their slow growth combined with an increasing commercial imperative don’t stack up too well for the future. In a bad snow year, with no skiing until the beginning of February and rapid melt down by the end of it, the powder was also conspicuously absent.

Alexander Henley, The Guardian

World leaders are queuing up to affirm their commitment to Lebanese unity, but all have picked their sides and placed their bets.

"We focus our efforts on helping Lebanon maintain its unity," Turkish prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan proclaimed generously  in Beirut last week. He is quite clear that Turkey does not favour any sect or party over another.

Bravo, we need more like him, you might say, except that we do in fact have too many like him. Erdoğan’s visit is highly reminiscent of that by President Ahmadinejad  of Iran last month.

Ahmadinejad also trotted out the familiar refrain of unity, reconciliation and peace in Lebanon, The Iranian president visited the Shia south and addressed a crowd of Hezbollah supporters, whereas the Turkish premier travelled to the Sunni Akkar region in the north for a pro-government rally with the prime minister, Saad Hariri. Saad Hariri’s "March 14" coalition came to power with a campaign for "the truth" about his father’s murder. The Hezbollah-led opposition, however, has cast doubt on the UN investigation’s legitimacy with accusations of false witness.

Foreign powers have been competing to show the most "support for reconciliation" in Lebanon. Syria and Saudi Arabia, the main Arab sponsors of Hezbollah and March 14 respectively, have made much of ongoing but mysterious "efforts:  to defuse the situation.

Erdoğan made a point of his participation in the "Saudi-Syrian initiative" on Wednesday, and on Thursday the Iranian ambassador to Lebanon made a statement that "Iran is in constant contact and consultation" with Saudi Arabia, Syria and Turkey. Western leaders have been singing to the same tune: everybody wants peace. But everybody wants peace on their own terms. It is only because so many world powers have seized upon this dispute that the two sides have become intractable

In the aftermath of Lebanon’s 15-year civil war, developers are turning the capital into a version of Dubai. But there’s a lot of history at stake.

Newsweek:

The building boom is destroying not only the historic beauty of this Middle Eastern capital but also its social traditions. The old downtown area, now known as Solidere after the development company founded in 1994 by then–prime minister Rafik Hariri to rebuild the center, used to be the heart of Beirut, where all religious groups and social classes lived side by side—a rare haven of tolerance in a country divided by religious differences. During the war, many Christians who lived in the area fled downtown out of fear, leaving their homes and belongings behind to be seized by Shiite Muslims from the harder-hit south, who squatted there.

  Engineers Richa and Zakhria and creator Farah pose with Guinness World Records official Smith in front of a wine glass in Beirut Lebanon set  a record for the world’s biggest glass of wine. Organizers of a wine festival in Beirut poured around one hundred bottles of Lebanese wine into the giant glass, 2.4 meters high […]

مؤكداً أن التيار مستمر على مواقفه… الخازن: لا انسحاب لوزراء التكتل من الحكومة وكلام جعجع موقف سياسي وليس مبادرة 

فيرونيك خباز

Alkalimaonline

أكد عضو "تكتل التغيير والإصلاح" النائب فريد الخازن أن  ليس هناك من خطاب تصعيدي إنما موقف إتخذه رئيس "التكتل" العماد ميشال عون، منذ سنوات، بعد تشكيل شعبة المعلومات بشكل غير قانوني، مؤكدا انه هذا الأمر إعترف به الجميع وأولهم وزير الداخلية زياد بارود.

الخازن، وفي حديث إلى موقع "لاكلمة أون لاين"، لفت إلى أن الحملة على فرع المعلومات لا تتزامن مع موضوع المحكمة، كما يقال، إنما كان مطروحا منذ سنوات حول تجاوزاته وعدم قانونيته.

وإعتبر أن المشكلة هي من يحاسب هذا الجهاز الذي نشأ بطريقة غير شرعية وغير قانونية، وتوسع بشكل كبير جداً، مؤكداً أن ذلك الموضوع ليس بجديد ولايقصد به التصعيد، إنما هو كلام جدي ومسؤول ويجب اخذه بعين الاعتبار بهدف تصحيح الخطأ ووضع حد لتجاوزاته.

وأشار الخازن إلى أن مهمة أي نائب في المجلس محاسبة الحكومة والمسؤولين، سائلاً:" لماذا نشأ هذا الجهاز ولماذا توسع وأعطيت إليه كل الامكانات

ومن يحاسبه والى من يتبع ومن المسؤول عنه حسب التراتبية العسكرية والادارية.