"PA" ,  A million demonstrators chanting

BEIRUT, Lebanon (AP) - Maronite Cardinal Nasrallah Sfeir, a strong critic of Syria's control in Lebanon who left Monday for a meeting with President Bush has emerged as a key opposition figure whose influence cuts across sectarian lines in this religiously diverse nation. The soft-spoken 84-year-old patriarch, head of the Maronite Catholic Church, began criticizing Syrian interference in Lebanese affairs when few dared challenge the authority of the pro-Syria government and its Syrian backers. His first major salvo came in September, months before Lebanon was thrust into the spotlight with the Feb. 14 assassination of former Premier Rafik Hariri, a killing that has triggered mass street demonstrations demanding that Syria get out of Lebanon.

BEIRUT (AFP) - By car, bus and boat thousands of Lebanese poured into the capital for a huge demonstration called by an emboldened opposition determined to end Syria's near 30-year military presence in Lebanon. Hours before the mid-afternoon start to the rally, more than 1 million people, according to estimates by correspondents and photographers, were packed into Martyrs Square in central Beirut. Many waved the red, white and green Lebanese flag on a splendid, sun-splashed Mediterranean morning near the grave of former prime minister Rafiq Hariri, assassinated in a bomb blast exactly one month ago and in whose memory the rally has been called.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Bush said on Tuesday authoritarian rule in the Middle East is the "last gasp of a discredited past" and he demanded Syria pull troops out of Lebanon before Lebanese parliamentary elections in May. Bush used a wide-ranging speech at the National Defense University to lend verbal support to what he called a trend toward democracy in the Middle East. "Suddenly the thaw has begun," he declared.