A1 Team Lebanon was out on track for qualifying today at the A1 Grand Prix of Nations EuroSpeedway. The demands of a new car and new engine required the team to devote track time to the technical demands from Zytek, with regard to the engine, and Lola for the chassis. This focus was reflected in the final qualifying times with Khalil Beschir lining up 24th on the grid.A1 Team Lebanon started the EuroSpeedway race weekend with a new A1 racing car, following Beschir’s accident during the Feature race at Brands Hatch, England. The new car required a series of technical procedures to be completed during the practice sessions and the team devoted most of its track time in free practice concentrating on these.  Khalil Beschir drove the car in first practice and with the limited time available for car setup, A1 Team Lebanon elected to optimize this with Beschir continuing to drive throughout the weekend. Team mate, Basil Shaaban, on hand at EuroSpeedway took the opportunity to join the Al Jazeera commentary team for the qualifying session adding a driver perspective for television viewers in the Arab world. The A1 Grand Prix qualifying format requires drivers to make four flying laps, within four 15 minute qualifying segments, with the best two times aggregated to produce the overall qualifying position. A1 Team Lebanon posted four good lap times, improving with each run, and with Beschir’s aggregate time less than three seconds off the pole sitter.

 BEIRUT, Lebanon  (UPI)– Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora Saturday launched a dialogue with the Palestinian groups in his country to ease rising tension between the two sides.  Siniora met with a delegation representing the Palestine Liberation Organization before holding talks with representatives of various pro-Syrian factions in Lebanon.  The talks came following tension between the two sides after the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – General Command accused the Lebanese authorities of "tightening the grip" around its bases outside the 12 Palestinian refugee camps. 

The Lebanese authorities set up check-points around two PFLP-GC bases – one on the Naameh Hills outside Beirut, and another in the Western Bekaa Valley near the Syrian border – after receiving information the Syrians were smuggling arms to the group’s centers.  The Syrian forces withdrew from Lebanon in late April after more than 20 years following popular and international pressure. Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine representative Marwan Abdul Aal described the talks with Siniora as a "big message of assurances," saying the meeting was "positive and there was a lot of understanding."

 (MENAFN) According to central bank statistics, Lebanon’s public debt grew to $33.8 billion by the end of July from $33.3 billion a month earlier, Reuters reported. Total external borrowing rose $59.1 million to reach $18.37 billion at the end of July, the bank said in its monthly bulletin. Domestic debt rose $468 million to reach […]

 By ZEINA KARAM, Associated Press Writer Tue Oct 4,11:29 AM ET,  BEIRUT, Lebanon – Lebanon’s government appointed a new security chief Tuesday, replacing a powerful general implicated in the assassination of the former prime minister as authorities attempt to tackle a deterioration in law and order.  The appointment came after months of political wrangling among factions in the half-Christian, half-Muslim Cabinet. The government has been trying to oust pro-Syrian officials, who are blamed for increasing lawlessness in the capital.The government postponed a decision on a long-awaited plan to overhaul the security services amid continuing discussions on whether to dissolve an intelligence gathering agency or simply name a new commander for it. In the most prominent of several appointments, the Cabinet appointed army Brig. Gen. Wafiq Jizzini to head the Interior Ministry’s General Security Department.

 BEIRUT, Lebanon (UPI) — A Lebanese man killed in a land dispute between two Syrian and Lebanese border villages was buried Monday.Khaled Bridi, 40, was slain Sunday in the outskirts of his village Arsal, in Lebanon`s eastern Bekaa valley on the border with Syria, when gunmen from the Syrian village of Falita crossed the border […]

 BEIRUT (Reuters) – A U.N. team investigating the killing of Lebanese former Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri will ask for an extension of its mandate until mid-December, the Lebanese premier said on Sunday.A U.N. team led by German prosecutor Detlev Mehlis is due to report to the Security Council by October 25 on the February assassination which plunged Lebanon into its worst crisis since the 1975-1990 civil war.The Security Council has already extended the inquiry’s original three-month deadline once but Mehlis now looks set to ask for more time.

"I think (Mehlis) will take all the necessary measures so his mission continues until December 15, which was the period originally assigned to him by the Security Council," Prime Minister Fouad Siniora told reporters, giving no explanation. The Security Council ordered the U.N. investigation after a fact-finding mission concluded Lebanon was incapable of conducting a credible inquiry of its own.It gave Mehlis three months but he was allowed to ask for a maximum of three extra months, taking the probe to mid-December.

BEIRUT (Reuters) – Lebanon has asked 11 countries and the United Nations to help train its security forces after a string of bombings and assassinations that have fuelled fears of a slide into chaos, the prime minister said on Thursday. "We have knocked on the doors of all the countries that could help us," Fouad Siniora told a news conference after the cabinet’s weekly meeting. "We are not facing an ordinary criminal…But we will gather all the tools, training and expertise we can obtain to live up to the challenge," he said. The countries which have responded positively to Lebanon’s plea were the United States, France, Russia, Egypt and Qatar, Siniora said. The government has also asked for help from six other states including Britain, Canada and China. Twelve explosions have rocked Lebanon since the Feb. 14 assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri, which plunged the country into its worst political and security crisis since the end of the 1975-1990 civil war.