AMERICAN LEBANESE COORDINATION COUNCIL

“I need more assistance politically, militarily against indirect Syrian occupation because the direct Syrian occupation is no more.”

Jumblat, who is scheduled to meet Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Wednesday, said in an American Enterprise Institute conference that Syria still holds sway in an “indirect” occupation, working through Hizbullah and other allies.

“I will do everything to liberate my country from indirect Syrian occupation,” said Jumblat, the leader of the Progressive Socialist Party of Lebanon.

Lebanon has been in turmoil since the Feb. 2005 murder of ex-Premier Rafik Hariri, which has been widely blamed on Syria.

The assassination forced an end to 29 years of Syrian military domination in Lebanon.

Since then, Lebanon has been shaken by other attacks, which many also blame on Syria, a war between Israel and Hizbullah that left 1,200 mostly civilian Lebanese dead, and a Hizbullah-led opposition campaign to oust the government of Premier Fouad Saniora.

Jumblat also met with U.S. President George Bush on Monday, An Nahar newspaper said.

It said Bush reiterated his government’s support for the creation of a Special International Tribunal for Lebanon to prosecute suspects in ex-Premier Rafik Hariri’s murder and related crimes.

An Nahar said the U.S. president also reiterated his commitment in backing the Saniora government politically, economically and militarily.(AFP-Naharnet)

One source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that “had the battery been installed, the charge was set to explode in exactly five minutes.”

The explosive charge was discovered in the first floor of a residential building in Mkaless. The apartment had not been let.

A police communiqué said a squad of its intelligence branch carried out a “swift operation during which it confiscated 31 explosive sets.”

The communiqué said the confiscated sets included “sophisticated electro-chemical timers-detonators that can be timed to explode after as late as 124 days.”

The sets were confiscated in an area “in the vicinity” of the Ain el-Hilweh Palestinian refugee camp, near the southern port city of Sidon, 45 kilometers from Beirut, the communiqué said.

The sets were to be “smuggled and used in terrorist acts,” the communiqué added.

The source, however, told Naharnet the sets were busted nearly 12 days ago in the Sikkeh district of ain el-Hilweh in a “daring, swift and clean raid.”

The sets, according to the source, were “assembled and awaiting a squad to smuggle them to another location. Police, apparently, postponed issuing a communiqué on the bust in an effort to tail members of what is believed to be a major network of terrorists operating between various sectors of Lebanon”.

He said material used in the sets is of an “eastern European origin.” He refused to elaborate.

British, U.S. and European Union intelligence agencies have been searching since August for the lethal liquid explosives after London said in unveiled a scheme to blow up passenger aircraft on flights across the Atlantic.

Stringent security measures have been applied at almost all western airports, banning air passengers from carrying any liquids, even food for infants.

The Lebanese police operation was the first ever reported bust of liquid explosives in the world.

The United States is stepping up covert operations in Iran in a new strategy that risks sparking an “open confrontation” and benefits Sunni radicals, The New Yorker reported in its latest issue.
In the magazine, Seymour Hersh reports that U.S. military and special-operations teams have increased their activities inside Iran, entering from Iraq to gather intelligence and to pursue Iranians who operate inside Iraq.

A series of unexploded bombs and dynamites have been found in Beirut, mount, north and south Lebanon over the past week, raising fears of renewed violence in trouble- ridden Lebanon.

“It looks as if we went more than twenty years back and learned nothing from all the ordeals and tragedies that we went through,” Sfeir said in his weekly sermon at Bkirki on Sunday.

“It looks like we can do without the Lebanese army which is the safety valve for all the Lebanese,” the patriarch said.

Sfeir reiterated his criticism over the round-the-clock Opposition protest in downtown Beirut which is spearheaded by Hizbullah.

The Opposition has been camping outside Grand Serail in the city center since Dec. 1 in a bid to bring down Prime Minister Fouad Saniora’s government.

The daily An Nahar on Monday said the patriarch’s remarks raised concern amongst the political circles who believe Sfeir would not have issued such a warning had he not received data from “trustworthy” sources.

Raad was quoted by the daily an-Nahar as saying Geagea and Jumblat were against the “principles set by (Ex-Premier) Rafik Hariri and Kamal Jumblat.”

Hariri, father of parliamentary majority leader Saad Hariri, was killed by a powerful blast that targeted his motorcade in Beirut on Feb. 14 2005.

Kamal Jumblat, father of Walid and founder of the PSP, was killed in an ambush on March 16 1977.

Both crimes have been blamed on the Syrian regime, which is one of Hizbullah’s mail supporters.

Jumblat left for Washington Saturday to discuss the Lebanon situation with U.S. officials.

However, Geaea responded quickly to Raad’s rhetoric saying the Hizbullah-led opposition has launched a “counter revolution against the Cedars’ Revolution in an effort to push the situation back to where it was during the past 15 years,” when Syria’s army and intelligence ruled Lebanon.

Geagea also escalated his counter attack, stressing that pro-government factions “reject” a compromise cabinet that gives the majority 19 seats, the opposition 10 seats and allocates one seat for a neutral minister.

“The problem is going to be a long one, Lebanon’s fate will be decided during this crisis, but this does not prevent reaching provisional settlements,” Geagea said.

He stressed that the “real solution (will be achieved) when Lebanon sets course. The Cedar Revolution Course is going ahead,” Geagea stressed.

Observers say Raad’s remarks reflect an effort by Hizbullah and Iran to drive a wedge in the alliance between Hariri , Geagea and Jumblat, an attempt that the parliamentary majority leader has been aware of and keen on foiling.

The meeting would be the first between senior leaders from both countries since the Saudi-Syrian rift widened after this summer’s Israel-Hizbullah war when Syrian President Bashar Assad labeled several Arab leaders “half men.”

CNA, citing diplomatic sources, said the meeting will deal with the Arab summit, which is due in Riyadh in March, and influencing Damascus to adopt the international tribunal.

The sources said Faisal was discussing with Spanish leaders the ongoing Lebanese crisis and the need to endorse the tribunal.

CNA quoted the sources as saying that once the tribunal is approved by Syria, rival Lebanese groups would then move to discuss the creation of the Special International Tribunal for Lebanon to prosecute Hariri’s suspected assassins.

Hariri was killed with 22 other people in a massive suicide truck bombing Feb. 14, 2005 and many Lebanese blamed Syria for the killing, an allegation denied by Damascus.