LCCC NEWS BULLETIN
MAY 20/2006
Below news bulletins from the Daily Star
for20/05/06
Hariri meets with Putin at Black Sea resort
Slain soldier laid to rest, praised for 'sacrifice'
Syrian jailers are 'beating' detained rights lawyer
Arms keep entering Lebanon as soldier dies of wounds
Top PLO man wants all sides to join talks with Beirut
Mixed signals on whether new draft electoral law is ready for submission
UN investigators revisit site of Hariri assassination
Lebanon contemplates joining International Criminal Court
Ahdab security guard dies in police custody
Siniora urged UN to tone down resolution
Below news bulletins from miscellaneous
sources for 20/05/06
Lebanon Native Eyes Further Action after Losing CIA Abduction-Naharnet
Lebanese Soldier Dies from Wounds Inflicted in Clashes with Pro-Syrian
Palestinians-Naharnet
Hariri Seeks Putin's Help to Stabilize Lebanon-Naharnet
Lebanon Native Eyes Further Action after Losing CIA Abduction Lawsuit in
U.S.-Naharnet
Iran Nuclear Crisis Pushes Up Tension on Lebanon-Israel Border-Naharnet
Gas Explosion at Ashrafiyeh Snack Shop Bleak Reminder of Last Year's Bombings-Naharnet
The US, and Resolution 1680-Dar Al-Hayat - Lebanon
Lessons from Iraq, Libya and Palestine-Dar Al-Hayat - Lebanon
Al-Qaida's corridor -Letter to the Patriot News. By: STELLA L. JATRAS, Camp Hi
US Court Turns Back Lawsuit Filed by Lebanon Native Against Ex-CIA-Naharnet
Iran: Mullahs' interference in Lebanon denounced-NCR-Iran.org
AP: UN Could Deepen Lebanon-Syria Tension-Houston Chronicle
Iran nuclear crisis pushes up tension on Lebanon-Israel border-Khaleej Times
Syria releases three Ahwazis, but four remain in custody-British Ahwazi
Friendship Society
The former troika system has been extended-Daily Star - Lebanon
Lebanese soldier dies in clashes-BBC News
EU criticises Syria on detentions-BBC News
Hariri meets with Putin
at Black Sea resort
Compiled by Daily Star staff -Saturday, May 20, 2006
The leader of the majority in the Lebanese Parliament met Friday with Russia's
president, two days after the UN Security Council pressed Syria to establish
diplomatic relations with Lebanon and mark their shared border.
The Kremlin said Beirut MP Saad Hariri's talks with Vladimir Putin were aimed at
helping to normalize the situation in the Middle East and strengthening Russian
influence in the region.
During their meeting at the Black Sea resort of Sochi - the Russian president's
summer residence - Hariri asked Putin for help settling Lebanon's political
situation, which was roiled by last year's bombing that killed Hariri's father
and 20 others.
Syria, which was widely accused of involvement in the murder, withdrew its
forces from Lebanon two months later.
"Our region is going through a difficult period of time, and there is the urgent
need to exchange opinions on the development of this situation," Hariri said in
televised comments.
He thanked Russia for supporting Lebanon in recent months and said he was
seeking to strengthen bilateral relations.
The Kremlin said in a statement that during his five-day visit, Hariri would
also meet with Russian Security Council Secretary Igor Ivanov and senior Russian
lawmakers. Damascus rejected Wednesday's Security Council vote, from which
Russia and China abstained and which called on Syria - and implicitly on Iran
for the first time - to stop supporting militias accused of trying to
destabilize Lebanon.
Russia and China officially backed Syria's view that the resolution was not
needed and constituted UN interference in Lebanese-Syrian relations. The Russian
Foreign Ministry said in a statement Thursday that the resolution was hasty and
unnecessary. However, Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora, who is strongly
backed by Hariri, has praised the resolution.
Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblatt also said Friday that the
resolution backs the consensus reached during Lebanon's national dialogue. He
called for establishing diplomatic relations with Syria.
Jumblatt was speaking following a meeting with U.S. Ambassador Jeffrey Feltman,
British Ambassador James Watt, French Ambassador Bernard Emie, Argentinean
Ambassador Jose Pedro Pico and the UN representative to Lebanon, Geir Pedersen,
at the Chouf MP's home in Mukhtara.
"What is required is minimum stability and diplomatic relations with Syria and
this is what the resolution called for," Jumblatt said. He also called for the
integration of Hizbullah's military wing into the Lebanese Army.
"These weapons should be with the Lebanese Army and under its command and the
command of the Lebanese authorities," he said. "Anything outside this formula
would lead to the extinction of the country and the Taif Accord."
Maronite Patriarch Nasrallah Boutros Sfeir also welcomed the UN's decision,
calling it "a good resolution," and urged Syria to accept it, demarcate the
border, and recognize Lebanon's independence.
Separately, President Emile Lahoud headed Friday to Egypt's Red Sea resort of
Sharm el-Sheikh for the three-day World Economic Forum (WEF) beginning on
Saturday. Lahoud reportedly leads a 74-member delegation that includes Foreign
Minister Fawzi Salloukh.
The Lebanese president said he would attempt during his meetings in Sharm
el-Sheikh to attract international businessmen and investors to his country and
to emphasize its presence on the international economic scene.
The WEF Middle East event gathers global leaders to discuss the political,
social and economic affairs of the region.
Siniora will join the gathering on Sunday, when he is scheduled to deliver two
speeches, and will return to Beirut on the same day. He will be accompanied by
nine people.
In another development, the Bahraini Parliament's first vice chairman, Abdulhadi
Marhoon - who is in Lebanon to participate in a conference on the International
Criminal Court - visited leaders of the Free Patriotic Movement and Hizbullah.
Marhoon said his meetings were to exchange views and assess the regional
situation.
He also called for the strengthening of Lebanese-Bahraini relations on all
levels and praised Lebanon's national dialogue, describing it as "a means to
entrench peace and solve debatable issues. This is what all Arabic countries
need."
- With agencies, additional reporting by Nada Bakri, Nafez Qawas and Maher
Zeineddine
Arms keep entering
Lebanon as soldier dies of wounds
By Rym Ghazal -Daily Star staff
Saturday, May 20, 2006
BEIRUT: A Lebanese soldier died in hospital on Friday, two days after being
wounded in clashes between the army and pro-Syrian Palestinian gunmen near the
Syrian border. In the latest development since the violence, officials confirmed
that trucks carrying arms and members of the Fatah al-Intifada had in fact
entered Lebanon from Syria, after initially denying such reports. Corporal
Mustafa Medlej, 21, died in hospital in the southeastern village of Jeb Janine
after sustaining two head wounds during clashes on Wednesday between Lebanese
troops and Fatah al-Intifada militants in the mountainous area of Halwa-Yanta,
located about three kilometers from the Syrian border, according to an army
statement. "There was a redeployment of men and arms in the posts held by Fatah
al-Intifada on Wednesday and Thursday night," the statement said.
"Several of the Palestinian
fighters involved in the shooting of Lebanese soldiers have been identified and
they will be arrested immediately and prosecuted by the Lebanese judiciary," he
added.
Security sources told The Daily Star that the army had asked that three members
of Fatah al-Intifada be handed over, not two as had been previously reported.
The three are said to be responsible for starting the incident Wednesday.
Initial reports said Fatah al-Intifada had received late Wednesday from Syria
some 50 new members and five trucks laden with arms and ammunition to reinforce
their positions. After a Cabinet meeting Thursday, Acting Interior Minister
Ahmed Fatfat and Premier Fouad Siniora denied the reports, although both had
confirmed them before the session. Siniora's office released a statement Friday
"confirming the crossing of three trucks, four Jeeps - one with a B10 Canon and
one anti-aircraft gun - and 50 armed fighters from Fatah al-Intifada who joined
the group's post in Idris Fortress in Wadi el-Asswad."
When contacted by The Daily Star, Fatfat said: "The initial reports were based
on media reports, and the more recent one is from the Defense Ministry, which I
am sticking to."
But Fatfat added that he "never confirmed anything," and said that he had been
waiting for confirmation from the army, which "confirmed that the group was
re-equipped with new members and arms."
"By stating they were re-equipped, it implies that the arms probably came
through the trucks," Fatfat added.
Sources at the Defense Ministry also confirmed that "arms and members came
across the border," but added that "there is no need to panic as everything is
under control with tighter security measures in the area to prevent any new
clashes."
"Numbers of the members of Fatah al-Intifada that entered could be more or less
than the reported 50. It is difficult to say, as there seems to be ongoing
movement along the borders of this particular group," said a Daily Star source.
Security sources said the pro-Syrian Popular Front for the Liberation of
Palestine-General Command in Naameh had "expanded its mine field around its
bases and increased its night patrols."
Meanwhile, officials from Fatah al-Intifada denied any connection with the
clashes, and called media reports of the incident "misleading." "We did not
transport any new arms to Lebanon, but reports are being circulated to cause
further pressure on the Palestinian groups under the umbrella of UN Security
Council Resolution 1559," Abu Fadi Hammad, the secretary of Fatah al-Intifada in
Lebanon said. "We highly respect the Lebanese Army and we would not deliberately
enter into clashes with them. Any information stating that we did is aimed at
causing disruption," Hammad added.
The clashes occurred shortly before the Security Council approved Resolution
1680, which reinforced calls for the withdrawal of all foreign forces from
Lebanon and the disarmament of all militias. - With agencies
Slain soldier laid to rest, praised for 'sacrifice'
Leaders decry killing by palestinian militants
By Therese Sfeir -Daily Star staff
Saturday, May 20, 2006
BEIRUT: Political and religious leaders conveyed their condolences on Friday to
the family of a Lebanese soldier who succumbed to wounds sustained earlier this
week during a clash with Palestinian militants on the eastern border.
Mustafa Medlej, 21, was seriously wounded during an exchange of fire on
Wednesday between army troops and members of the Damascus-based Fatah al-Intifada.
The soldier succumbed to his wounds Friday in hospital in the southeastern
village of Jub Jennin. According to a statement issued by Lebanese Army
Commander General Michel Suleiman, Medlej was born in the northern area of
Dinnieh in 1985 and joined the army in 2004. Upon his death, he was awarded the
Lebanese war medal and injured medal, as well as the honorary military bronze
medal.
Medlej's body was laid to rest in Dinnieh town of Bqarsouna. Funeral services
were attended by high-ranking military and political figures. Official services
to honor the fallen soldier were also held before the Central Military Hospital
in Badaro.
A torrent of statements of condolences was issued Friday by the country's
leaders.
Speaker Nabih Berri said Medlej's death reminded him of "the beginning of the
Civil War, which started with clashes between Lebanese and Palestinians," and
urged Palestinians to deal with the army "as their strength and not a power used
against them."
In a telephone call, Premier Fouad Siniora offered his condolences to Suleiman
and "paid tribute to the soldiers who offered sacrifices for the sake of
Lebanon's security."
Grand Mufti Sheikh Mohammed Rashid Qabbani denounced the death and clashes as a
"violation of the dignity of all Lebanese."Future Movement leader MP Saad
Hariri, presently on a visit to Russia, telephoned the Medlej family to convey
his "deepest condolences for his death." Hariri condemned the attack and praised
the soldiers' efforts in "preserving the country's sovereignty."In a statement
Progressive Socialist Party spokesperson Rami Rayes criticized "some political
parties' abstention from condemning the attack against the Lebanese Army."
"It seems that some parties were annoyed by Suleiman's visit to Jordan because
they believe that such a visit would have negative repercussions on their
regional alliances and are trying to hamper any stability along the borders,"
Rayes said.
President Emile Lahoud also telephoned Suleiman for a briefing on developments
in the Bekaa and measures being taken by the army to restore order in the area.
Lahoud asked Suleiman to extend his condolences to the Medlej family.
Residents in the Western Bekaa town of Suweiri took to the streets once word of
Medlej's death spread to express their support for the army, while a general
sense of mourning prevailed in the area.
Demonstrators carried Lebanese flags and denounced the attack on the soldiers.
Condolences can be paid to the Medlej family at the home of Hajj Khodr Medlej,
Mustafa's grandfather, in the town of Bqarsouna.
Syrian jailers are 'beating' detained rights lawyer
By Rym Ghazal - Daily Star staff
Saturday, May 20, 2006
BEIRUT: A prominent Syrian human rights lawyer who was arrested this week is
being subject to beatings, his brother said Friday, even as the European Union
condemned Syria's latest crackdown on dissidents.
The official Syrian press announced Friday that 17 "Syrian traitors" have been
arrested this week - including lawyer Anwar al-Bunni - in connection with the
signing of the "Beirut-Damascus Declaration," which urged the Syrian government
to recognize Lebanon's independence and called for better relations between the
two countries.
"It has now become forbidden to even think in Syria," Bunni's brother Akram told
The Daily Star in a telephone interview.
Late Wednesday, Anwar Bunni was taken from his home by Syrian security
personnel.
"He called out to me for help as we live in the same building, but by the time I
got to him, he was gone," said Akram, adding that he had been informed by
lawyers who visited his brother that "he was beaten, with visible marks on his
face."
The EU issued a statement criticizing Syria and urged the "Syrian authorities to
reconsider all cases of political prisoners and immediately release all
prisoners of conscience."
"The EU expresses its deep concern about the recent widespread harassment of
human rights defenders, their families and peaceful political activists, in
particular arbitrary arrests and repeated incommunicado detention," said the
statement.
Contacted by The Daily Star, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said the arrests were "a
clear message by the Syrian regime that it has zero tolerance toward any form of
dissidence in Syria."
HRW's representative for the Middle East, Nadim Houry, said: "The arrests of
activists and intellectuals by Syrian authorities have been happening over the
past year, with increased intensity over the past few days, to declare there is
no room for a third middle opinion, one between the official Syrian line and the
international community line."
Akram al-Bunni cast doubt on the official reason given for the arrests, saying
that "there are tens of other writings and petitions of this nature, so why such
a strong reaction to this particular petition, which in no way offends the
regime?"
Akram, a journalist, spent 17 years behind bars for some of his writings, which
were considered "against the regime."
"This new campaign is probably a local reaction to the international pressures
on Syria, such as the new UN Security Council Resolution 1680," he said, "but
what is the logic in that? I don't know."
Akram Bunni said he expects to be arrested soon, adding that "the wave of
arrests will continue until all Syrians who signed the petition are behind
bars."
"The sentencing can take up months, if not years, as has been known to take
place in Syria's judicial system," he added.
The petition was signed by at least 300 Syrian and Lebanon intellectuals and was
published in Beirut last Thursday.
Denunciations of the arrests were also launched by Lebanese officials such as
Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblatt and former Prime Minister
Salim Hoss, who sent a letter to President Bashar Assad requesting the release
of the detainees.
Lebanon contemplates joining International Criminal
Court
By Leila Hatoum -Daily Star staff
Saturday, May 20, 2006
BEIRUT: The International Criminal Court "is significant on the level of
combating international and major crimes," and Arab countries should be aware of
its importance, said Raymond Shadeed, former head of the Beirut Bar Association
(BBA).
Shadeed was speaking at a conference entitled "Lebanon joining the ICC:
mechanism and repercussions" held at the BBA headquarters. The conference was
organized by Justice Without Borders, the International Parliamentarian
Movement, the International Alliance for the ICC, and the International Human
Rights Federation, and was attended by members of Parliament and representatives
from Lebanon, Jordan, Morocco, Holland, and Bahrain.
The ICC is the first ever permanent, international criminal court established by
treaty to promote the rule of law and ensure that the gravest international
crimes don't go unpunished.
So far, Lebanon has signed initial letters on the Rome Statute of the ICC, but
Parliament hasn't ratified it for several reasons, including controversy
surrounding internal jurisdiction and the law amendments that accompanies such
the ratification.
The Rome Statute by which the ICC was established, was signed on July 17, 1998
at the United Nations Diplomatic Conference of Plenipotentiaries on the
Establishment of an International Criminal Court and came into force on July 1,
2002.
According to ICC's Web site, "The Court shall be complementary to national
criminal jurisdictions," but some Lebanese ministers fear the court would
infringe on national sovereignty.
Bridgette Chelbian, the head of Justice Without Borders, said that Lebanon would
play "an important role if it ratifies the Rome Statute, and would contribute to
the guarantee of human rights on its territory," adding: "This ratification will
not limit Lebanon's sovereignty ... it would in fact allow Lebanon to practice
this sovereignty on the international arena." Head of the BBA Boutros Doumit
said he expects Lebanon to join the Rome Statute.
"Discussing this issue takes on a special dimension at a time when we are
preparing the establishment of a special international tribunal to try the
perpetrators of the assassination of former Premier Rafik Hariri," said Boutros
Doumit, Head of the BBA.
"This crime ... has led to a unanimous local and international agreement that
the perpetrators ... must be revealed and brought to justice ... and this is
where it meets with the purposes of the establishing of the ICC," Doumit said.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Al-Qaida's corridor
Friday, May 19, 2006
By: STELLA L. JATRAS, Camp Hill : Americans were led to believe that Bosnia is a
perfect example of a success story, a model if you will, for other conflicts
throughout the world. Now we are reading of "Terrorists troll Balkans to find
'white Muslims'."
What is even more important in this April 18 Associated Press report is the
information which exposes the truth, that "Bosnia has become a breeding ground
for terrorists, including some on international wanted lists."
Those of us who have been following the civil war in the Balkans knew this as
far back as 1992 when Alija Izetbegovic, Bosnian Muslim president, issued a
passport to Osama bin Laden in his Vienna embassy in 1992, where the world's
greatest terrorist was able to visit both Bosnia and Kosovo.
Izetbegovic wrote in his Islamic Declaration, "There can be no peace or
coexistence between Islamic faith and non-Islamic faith political institutions
... The Islamic movement must and can take place as soon as it is morally and
numerically strong enough, not only to destroy the non-Islamic one, but to build
up a new Islamic one."
Today, Bosnia has become al-Qaida's corridor into Europe, as we are now
witnessing. As an example, one of the main terrorists in the Madrid bombing was
born in Bosnia.
The Counterrevolution of the Cedars
by Gary C. Gambill
Mideast Monitor
April/May, 2006
http://www.mideastmonitor.org/issues/0604/0604_1.htm
By and large, the sclerotic governing elite of Syrian-occupied Lebanon has
managed to survive the withdrawal of Syrian forces. Parliament Speaker Nabih
Berri and President Emile Lahoud remain in their posts, while the premiership
has merely passed to Fouad Siniora, a regime stalwart who ran the finance
ministry of Syria's satellite state in Beirut twice as long as all others
combined. Nearly all of the ministers in the current cabinet either held
high-ranking government positions under Syrian rule or are politically
subordinate to others who did.
Rather than bringing about the collapse of occupied Lebanon's ruling elite, the
Syrian withdrawal merely precipitated a purge of one governing faction by its
rivals. The victors are not a reformist wing of the regime, but a powerful
clique, led by allies of the late Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri and Druze leader
Walid Jumblatt, responsible for its worst excesses. While they've severed their
affiliations with Syria (for the time being) and christened themselves the
"March 14 coalition" (referring to the mass anti-Syrian demonstration in Beirut
last year), they are intent on preserving the political and socio-economic power
they derived from years of service to Damascus.
Not surprisingly, their bid for political hegemony in the new Lebanon has been
resisted by the same grassroots nationalist movement that spearheaded challenges
to their authority during the occupation - Gen. Michel Aoun's secular
nationalist Free Patriotic Movement (FPM). By keeping in place a notorious
electoral law drafted by Syrian military intelligence to protect favored
incumbents, the Hariri-Jumblatt axis managed to win a majority of the seats in
parliamentary elections last year, but the nationalists swept the Christian
heartland and gained enough seats to obstruct parliament's election of anyone
other than Aoun as president.
This has led to a critical impasse. Leaders of the March 14 coalition are loath
to permit the ascension of their nemesis to the presidency. Recognizing that
Aoun is overwhelmingly the most popular candidate in both the Christian
community (for whom the presidency is constitutionally reserved) and Lebanon as
a whole,[1] they are careful not to dismiss his candidacy publicly. Behind the
scenes, however, they are feverishly working to thwart Aoun's presidential bid
and appealing for the intervention of outsiders, including Syrian President
Bashar Assad (who they believe is able and willing to force Lahoud's resignation
for the right price). Even if they find a "regional solution," however,
circumventing Aoun's ascension at a time when public demands for sweeping reform
are at a peak would likely destabilize the country, particularly if it is
brought about through foreign intervention.
In the meantime, the Hariri-Jumblatt coalition's refusal to share power with the
FPM has saddled the government with a weak, discredited president, hindered
reform of the security apparatus, and precluded serious negotiations over the
status of Hezbollah's arms. More ominously, its drive to monopolize power is
polarizing Lebanon along sectarian lines, with most Sunnis and Druze supporting
the government, and most Christians and Shiites (the politically and
economically disenfranchised of occupied Lebanon) uniting against it. As
Sunni-Shiite antagonism engulfs Iraq in violence and stokes Iranian-Arab
tensions, Lebanon's political paralysis and disunity virtually ensures that it
will eventually pay the forfeit.
Functional Authoritarianism in Lebanon
"Verily the lust for comfort murders the passion of the soul, and then walks
grinning in the funeral."[2]
Lebanese poet Khalil Gibran, 1923
In 1992, two years after Syrian air and ground forces crushed Lebanese army
troops under Aoun's command and swept away the last remnants of Lebanon's First
Republic, the country was teetering on the brink of collapse. Inflation was
running at 130% and rioting in Beirut had brought down two governments in just
five months. The root cause of Lebanon's malaise was the fact that no one had
any confidence that the motley assortment of ex-warlords entrusted to govern by
the Syrians were up to the task of rebuilding a country they had so recently
destroyed.
Hariri, the son of a poor Lebanese greengrocer who made a fortune in Saudi
Arabia during the oil boom, had been quietly lobbying Damascus to be prime
minister for some time. The billionaire construction tycoon not only had the
reputation and international connections needed to boost investor confidence in
Lebanon, but his Saudi benefactors were willing to sweeten the deal with
considerable financial aid. The Syrians were wary, however, as Hariri's wealth
and close personal relations with the Saudi royal family would make him harder
to push around. Reeling from a cutoff of Soviet aid and increasingly desperate
to jumpstart the war-shattered economy of his new satellite state, the late
Syrian President Hafez Assad finally relented, and Hariri took office in October
1992.
The system of governance that evolved under Hariri has been called "functional
authoritarianism,"[3] as it is largely devoid of any overarching ideological
vision. While Hariri frequently talked of making Lebanon the "Singapore of the
Middle East," his administration's frenzied reconstruction drive and runaway
deficit spending were driven less by economic philosophy than by the imperative
of extracting the greatest possible amount of graft. Rampant embezzlement of
public funds was already the order of the day in Lebanon, of course, and it is
important to keep in mind that the prime minister was an outsider (having lived
in Saudi Arabia for nearly three decades and assumed citizenship there) entering
a political arena in which everyone from the Syrians on down expected to be paid
for their political support, but the scale and consequences of institutionalized
corruption in the 1990s are unmistakable. A 2001 UN-commissioned corruption
assessment report estimated that Lebanon had been losing $1.5 billion in graft
annually (nearly 10% of the country's GDP).[4] There were three basic mechanisms
of extraction.
The first operated through government borrowing. In just six years, Lebanon's
national debt soared from $2.5 billion to $18.3 billion (and has since swelled
to $38 billion public debt, or 183 percent of GDP, the highest such ratio in the
world), most of it financed by issuing treasury bonds to select Lebanese banks
at exorbitant real interest rates (over 30% at times).[5] As Guilain Denoeux and
Robert Springborg observed in their authoritative assessment of Lebanon's
reconstruction boom, "the single largest owner of Lebanese bank stocks is the
prime minister," making him "a primary beneficiary" of his own government's
rising indebtedness.[6] Since the Syrians and many of their Lebanese allies were
also heavily invested in Lebanon's banking sector, there were few objections to
the frightening pace of Hariri's deficit spending.
The second form of extraction took place through government expenditures. Only
2.4% of $6 billion worth of reconstruction and development projects examined in
above mentioned corruption assessment report were formally awarded by the
Administration of Tenders.[7] Consequently, the government habitually overpaid
for construction contracts by a large margin (over 30% by most estimates) and
misdirected funds to redundant and inefficient uses.[8] Little reconstruction
funding was spent outside the capital or outside of the construction and service
sectors, in part because far less graft can be extracted from importing tractors
or expanding public transportation.
The third level of extraction involved favored treatment of private sector
companies in which Hariri and other elites were heavily invested (or from which
they received hefty bribes). Solidere, a real estate development company in
which Hariri owned a major share, was awarded an exclusive contract to rebuild
the central district of Beirut (and the power to expropriate property at will).
Hariri granted an exclusive monopoly over the wireless phone market to two
companies in which his allies and other Syrian-backed politicians owned major
shares, allowing them to charge exorbitant fees and reap windfall profits.[9]
Lack of government transparency and reliable contract enforcement ensured that
private sector investors (whether Lebanese or foreign) only entered a market if
they had cut deals with governing elites. Consequently, almost none of the
estimated $40 billion in expatriate Lebanese capital assets flowed back into
Lebanon.
Although corruption was endemic in Lebanon long before Syrian troops marched in,
the supercharged scale of profiteering in occupied Lebanon during the 1990s was
sustainable only under the shadow of Syrian power. Economically, Harirism was
almost perfectly convergent with Syrian interests. The unregulated flow of
roughly one million unskilled Syrian workers into Lebanon during the 1990s was
devastating to the predominantly Shiite urban poor, but it suited Lebanese
construction tycoons just fine and drew billions of dollars annually into the
cash-strapped Syrian economy. Hariri's conspicuous neglect of agriculture was a
boon to Syrian farmers (and smugglers) who flooded Lebanon with untaxed produce.
He distributed exorbitant payoffs to the panoply of Syrian officials who
administered Lebanon, most notably Vice-president Abdul Halim Khaddam, Army
Chief-of-Staff Hikmat Shihabi, and the head of Syrian military intelligence in
Lebanon, Gen. Ghazi Kanaan. For this, Hariri was given clear (if not always
decisive) political preeminence over his rivals. Khaddam famously told a group
of ministers pressing for Hariri's resignation that the prime minister was "here
to stay until 2010."[10]
Institutionalized corruption shattered hopes of postwar prosperity for most
Lebanon. Despite enormous injections of money, economic growth rebounded to 8%
in 1994, then quickly tapered off, falling to under 2% in 1998. Income
inequality steadily increased,[11] owing to socio-economic policies that
privileged the postwar commercial elite. At a time when a quarter of the
population continued to live beneath the poverty line, the prime minister cut
income and corporate taxes to a flat 10%, while raising indirect taxes (e.g.
gasoline) on the public at large, slashing social expenditures, and freezing
public sector wages.
Hariri's policies necessitated steadily more repressive measures to maintain.
When Lebanon's historically vibrant labor movement rose in opposition, the prime
minister banned public demonstrations and manipulated elections of the national
trade union federation. Under the guise of "regulating" the audiovisual media,
he placed control of all major television and radio stations in the hands of
corrupt elites. Hariri's draconian restrictions on civil liberties forced him to
rely heavily on the military and its commander, Gen. Emile Lahoud, to maintain
public order, unwittingly strengthening a rival power center. More importantly,
the clampdown contributed to the growth of a powerful nationalist opposition
current that would decisively undermine Syria's grip on Lebanon
The Aoun Phenomenon
Although Lebanon's secular nationalist revival was fueled by socio-economic and
political conditions, its coalescence around Aoun reflected a deep reserve of
personal admiration dating back to his brief but monumental appearance on the
public stage. After serving as army chief-of-staff for four years, in 1988 Aoun
was appointed interim prime minister by outgoing President Amine Gemayel after
warring militias prevented parliament from convening to elect a new
president.[12] When Aoun attempted to enforce a maritime blockade of illegal
militia-run ports in the spring of 1989, Syrian forces retaliated by
relentlessly shelling civilian areas of east Beirut, prompting him to declare a
"war of liberation" against Syrian forces in Lebanon. Although he incurred the
united hostility of Lebanon's militia elite and traditional political class,
Aoun's crusade appealed to the public, drawing hundreds of thousands of people
to the presidential palace in December 1989 to form a "human shield" against
Syrian military forces encircling the free enclave. Thousands of Shiites and
Sunnis crossed over from Syrian-controlled territory to participate in what were
then the largest mass demonstrations in Lebanese history.
The political elite in Lebanon cynically dismissed the "Aoun phenomenon" as a
fleeting outburst of popular frustration by a population desperate for a hero.
"He was a David to an infinite Goliath," recalls former Foreign Minister Elie A.
Salem, "and this image was well received by all the non-sophisticated in
Lebanon, irrespective of religion and locale."[13] Aoun's modest background,
barely disguised contempt for corrupt politicians and militia leaders, and
honesty also struck powerful chords in Lebanon.
Syria's defeat of Aoun's forces in 1990 failed to extinguish the nationalist
current. From exile, Aoun continued denouncing the occupation and worked to
mobilize the Diaspora. Inside Lebanon, the movement went underground,
perceptible mainly in the widely recognized "Aoun honk" echoing through traffic
in Christian areas whenever Syrian forces were out of earshot. Over the next
decade, the Lebanese nationalist movement transformed from a latent current of
popular admiration for the general into to a broad-based, highly organized
opposition front.
Hariri unwittingly strengthened the Lebanese nationalist current by decimating
two alternate poles of secular opposition - the labor movement and the Lebanese
Forces (LF), a Christian nationalist militia-turned-political party led by Samir
Geagea. The arrest of Geagea in 1994 (on charges of masterminding the bombing of
a church) enabled the Syrians to pressure other LF leaders into quiescence by
dangling the prospect of a pardon for the next eleven years. Aoun's absence from
the country and strict adherence to nonviolence (after leaving government)
protected the movement from the fate that befell the LF.
By the 1995, a multitude of voices identifying themselves with the exiled former
general began dominating elections for independent trade and labor unions,
professional syndicates, and student councils. Because anyone could be an
Aounist, Aounism became a catch all banner for secular nationalism that
transcended sectarian boundaries, as illustrated by the triumph of "Aounist"
candidates in the 1995 student elections at the predominantly Muslim West Beirut
branch of the American University of Beirut (AUB). Aoun ranked third among
Shiite respondents asked to name their most preferred Lebanese leader in an
open-ended 1996 AUB survey.[14]
Manufacturing Lahoud
The growth of Aounism as a national political force substantially influenced
Assad's choice of Gen. Lahoud to succeed Elias Hrawi as president in 1998 and
promote him as a counterweight to Hariri (who was forced to resign for two
years). Whereas Hariri built a strong base of support within Lebanon's postwar
commercial elite and his own Sunni community, Lahoud presented himself as an
anti-corruption crusader and guardian of Christian communal interests, hoping to
capitalize on widespread resentment of Hariri and draw support away from Aoun.
Assad replaced the heads of Lebanon's military and security establishment with
officers close to Lahoud. This core military-security elite aligned itself with
traditional Sunni politicians sidelined by Hariri's rise, ex-warlords, and
pro-Syrian ideologues.
Although Lahoud and his new prime minister, Selim al-Hoss, lambasted Haririst
economic policies, they made only marginal adjustments (e.g. taxation rates) to
the economic edifice of Syrian-occupied Lebanon. The new administration launched
an anti-corruption drive that indicted nine senior Haririst officials,[15] but
was later forced to drop the charges - the Syrians wanted a balance of power
they could manipulate, not a full-blown assault on the Harirists. Hariri was
reinstated in 2000 after Bashar consolidated power, but his authority was
thereafter strictly curtailed (and his allies were cut out of the lucrative cell
phone business). Lahoud, not Hariri, was now first among equals in Syrian eyes.
While Lahoud served as an effective counterweight to Hariri for the time being,
efforts to build Christian support for the president ran into problems. The key
to the strategy was brokering an accord between Lahoud and mainstream Christian
political elites who had been excluded from government. In order to bolster
Lahoud's credibility and provide political cover for Christian elites to cut a
deal, the Syrians took steps to reduce the public visibility of their military
presence and exert control vicariously through the Lebanese security
establishment. By 1999, few Lebanese still had to suffer the indignity of
driving through a Syrian checkpoint on their way to work.
Aounist activists in Lebanon, now formally organized as the Free Patriotic
Movement (Al-Tayyar al-Watani al-Hurr), responded with a campaign of peaceful
sit-ins and demonstrations against the occupation on college campuses, often
leading to heavy-handed responses by the security forces. Photos of flag-waving
18-year-olds being water-hosed or beaten by riot police in the morning
newspapers thrust the reality of Syrian occupation squarely back into the public
mindset.
Lahoud's handling of the protests played straight into Aoun's hands. When the
FPM announced in March 2001 that the general was returning to Lebanon in 72
hours to lead a peaceful march on Syrian military positions, Lebanese and Syrian
officials panicked. Residents of Beirut awoke to find Lebanese tanks positioned
at major intersections of the city, military cordons around major universities,
and traffic along major thoroughfares at a standstill as police stopped cars to
check identity cards and search trunks. Aoun never showed up, of course, and the
thousands of students who answered his call were quickly dispersed, but the
event was a monumental public relations triumph. "Aoun wanted his activists to
close down Beirut in protest against Syria's domination. The army has done it
for him in their stead," one political analyst observed. "What more could Aoun
want?"[16]
Aoun's critics complained that he was deliberately provoking the authorities
into increasing the level of repression, which peaked in August 2001 with the
arrests of hundreds of opposition activists. Realizing that FPM demonstrations
were creating an atmosphere inhospitable to their talks with Lahoud and the
Syrians, mainstream Christian political elites (loosely organized under the
leadership of Maronite Christian Patriarch Nasrallah Boutros Sfeir as the Qornet
Shehwan Gathering) began routinely urging the public not to take part in the
protests, but their appeals fell on deaf ears. In fact, the strategy hurt their
leverage with Damascus. If the Christian political establishment was unable to
bring about an end to frequent anti-Syrian demonstrations, why should the
Syrians pay a high price for its support? While Aoun lobbied tirelessly abroad
for American sanctions on Syria, playing a major role in building congressional
support for the Syria Accountability Act, Sfeir and most Qornet Shehwan members
alienated the Christian public by publicly condemning the legislation.
By 2003, Aoun's popularity and the FPM's organizational strength had reached a
critical mass. Confident that the movement was capable of defeating pro-Syrian
candidates in majority Christian parliamentary districts (barring a blatantly
fraudulent tabulation of the votes), FPM officials decided to abandon their
long-standing boycott of legislative elections (which had been progressively
less effective in 1996 and 2000) and began preparing to mount a nationwide
electoral campaign.
The death of aging Baabda-Aley MP Pierre Helou in August 2003 provided the FPM
with an opportunity to test its electoral strength for the first time.
By-elections in Lebanon are normally a formality - when a sitting MP dies, his
next of kin is traditionally allowed to run unopposed. Qornet Shehwan decided
not to contest the election, and for good reason - Christian voters in the
district are outnumbered by its combined Druze and Shiite electorate, and
Helou's son, Henri, had received a "perfect storm" of endorsements from Jumblatt
and rival Druze leader Talal Arslan, both leading Shiite parties (the militant
Islamist Hezbollah movement and Amal), as well as both Hariri and Lahoud.
To the astonishment of most political analysts, the FPM nominated Hikmat Dib to
run for the seat. Expecting Dib to lose by a landslide, the vast majority of
mainstream Christian politicians either endorsed Helou or declined to endorse
anyone. Thousands of FPM volunteers poured into the district, however, speaking
to local communities about the party's platform and Dib's distinguished record
as an advocate of public freedoms. Though Dib narrowly lost the election (with
25,291 votes to Helou's 28,597), he won the overwhelming majority of Christian
votes and a sizable minority of Druze and Shiite votes, demonstrating that the
FPM had the electoral clout not only to sweep the Christian heartland, but
perhaps even to threaten the political establishment in mixed districts from the
Shouf to north Lebanon, in the 2005 elections.[17]
The FPM triumph eliminated any serious prospect of an accord between the
Maronite political establishment and Damascus. As Lahoud's term drew to a close
in 2004, the Syrians desperately tried to entice Qornet Shehwan leaders into
endorsing a three-year extension of his term (reportedly dangling the prospect
of Sfeir choosing Lahoud's successor in 2007), but there were no takers - the
popular backlash instigated by Aoun would have been overwhelming. Lahoud's
isolation provided an opening for Hariri, who secretly encouraged American and
European pressure on Syria to permit a constitutional presidential succession.
In the face of strong Western pressure on Syria, two members of Qornet Shehwan -
MP Nayla Mouawad and MP Boutros Harb - declared their candidacies and began
meeting with Syrian military intelligence officials. Assad ultimately decided
that neither had the clout to stand up to either Hariri or Aoun and went ahead
with plans to extend Lahoud's term, precipitating the passage of UN Security
Council Resolution 1559, which called for a Syrian withdrawal from Lebanon.
Although eager to draw upon support from his allies abroad, Hariri never really
aspired to lead Lebanon out of Syria's orbit, only to gain political hegemony
within it. After 1559, the prime minister spent weeks trying to persuade Assad
to let him name two-thirds of the cabinet and would no doubt have returned to
the fold if the Syrian president had relented. After leaving office in October,
Hariri quietly entered into talks with Qornet Shehwan over the formation of a
tripartite electoral alliance (along with Jumblatt) capable of trouncing the
Lahoudists in the 2005 elections.
Hariri's assassination in February was apparently intended to shatter this
alliance and initially appeared like it might do so. For two weeks, as mostly
Christian and Druze protestors demonstrated against the occupation, Hariri's
family and political allies remained silent and the Sunni masses stayed at home.
Only after it became clear that the West and the Saudis were committed to
driving Syria out did the Harirists begin playing a major role. And it was not
until Hezbollah mobilized an ill-timed half-million man (mostly Shiite) march in
support of Syria on March 8 that they fully committed themselves to the cause,
leading to an even larger demonstration against Syria on March 14. After several
more weeks of vacillation, Hariri's 35-year-old son, Saad, picked up where his
father left off.
Lebanon after the Occupation
This display of unity evaporated soon after Syrian troops withdrew in April, as
the country's main political factions regressed back to form in advance of the
May/June parliamentary elections. The most salient issue of dispute was the
electoral law, a marvel of political engineering designed by Syrian military
intelligence to regulate the parliamentary division of spoils.[18] Most majority
Christian administrative districts (qadas) were bundled with larger majority
Muslim districts,[19] making it impossible to win most of the 64 Christian seats
in parliament without the endorsement of Syrian-backed Sunni, Druze, and Shiite
power barons. Although Syrian troops were gone, the same barons quickly agreed
amongst themselves that there would be no amendment of the electoral law.
Aoun, who returned to Lebanon on May 7, loudly condemned this blatant ploy to
disenfranchise Christian voters, as did Sfeir and mainstream Christian
politicians,[20] though the latter's objections were largely rhetorical - they
had already agreed to join the Hariri-Jumblatt coalition as a junior partner.
Revising the electoral law would have increased the number of majority Christian
districts (likely to be swept by the FPM), while decreasing the number of
Christian seats in majority Muslim districts where Hariri and Jumblatt could
guarantee the election of Qornet Shehwan candidates. Fortunately for Hariri,
American and French officials stepped into the fray by repeatedly insisting that
there be no postponement of the elections (effectively precluding serious
redistricting negotiations).
After turning down an offer of three seats to join the March 14 coalition, Aoun
went head to head with Hariri in an electoral campaign marked by unsavory
tactics on all sides. The FPM included a few pro-Lahoud figures on its electoral
slate, while Hariri recruited radical Sunni Islamist preachers to get out the
vote in north Lebanon.[21] Whereas Hariri poured tens of millions of dollars
into his campaign, the FPM had to rely on fundraising, a practice hitherto
virtually unknown in Lebanese politics (parties in Lebanon have almost
invariably been funded by politicians themselves). In contrast to the
Hariri-Jumblatt coalition, the FPM had no broadcast media. Although the FPM and
its electoral allies swept majority Christian districts, winning 21 seats, the
Hariri-Jumblatt coalition won a solid 72-seat majority in the 128-member
parliament, while the Shiite Hezbollah-Amal alliance picked up 35 seats.
The Hariri-Jumblatt axis fell short of the two-thirds majority needed to
overturn Lahoud's extension and elect its own candidate in his stead. In order
to oust the president, they need the support of either the FPM bloc or the
Hezbollah-Amal alliance, neither of which is willing to sanction an alternative
to Aoun. Unable to handpick the next president, the Hariri-Jumblatt camp quickly
decided that a weak and discredited Lahoud as president was far preferable to
the ascension of Aoun.
The FPM briefly entered into talks with the March 14 coalition over the
formation of a national unity government, but the latter refused to give up any
frontline cabinet portfolios (Aoun would have accepted interior or justice) so
the FPM remained outside of government. Ironically, Hariri eventually agreed to
give the post to a Lahoudist, Charles Rizk, in exchange for the president's
support. Once again, Hariri preferred to partner with his enemies within the
political elite rather than share power with the nationalist opposition.
The FPM made efforts to work with the governing coalition, but was rebuffed.
Aoun has repeatedly called for the establishment of a parliamentary security
committee to oversee reform of the security apparatus, but the government has
refused, preferring to make decisions about hiring and firing in secrecy. FPM
officials complain that the Harirists are transforming the internal security
forces along sectarian lines, with a preponderance of new police recruits being
Sunni. Although reliable statistics are not available, the reaction of hundreds
of Lebanese riot police to a Sunni Islamist mob that set fire to a building
housing the Danish embassy in February ("moving aside as the demonstrators made
their way to their target," wrote one American journalist present) raised plenty
of suspicions.[22]
Another bone of contention concerns the fate of hundreds of Lebanese held in
Syrian prisons without charge, a cause that is close to Aoun's heart as some of
his former soldiers are believed to be among them.[23] Although eager to
lambaste Syria on every other issue under the sun, officials of the new Lebanese
government scarcely mention the detainees. The reason for this is common
knowledge in Lebanon. "Many of the Lebanese who perpetrated this crime, or
helped hide it while in government, are prominent figures on the Lebanese
political scene today," explains Ghazi Aad, the director of a local human rights
group working for their release. "It is not in their interest to raise the issue
and push strongly for putting an end to it."[24] For similar reasons, the
government has dragged its feet in exhuming some three dozen civil war era mass
graves believed to exist by Aad and other human rights activists.
The Hariri-Jumblatt coalition's inability to come to terms with its past also
impedes the country's economic future, Aounists charge. A central plank in the
FPM platform is the demand for an independent audit of Lebanon's public finances
over the last 15 years by an international firm (e.g. Standard and Poors). Some
Lebanese economists estimate that as much as half of Lebanon's current debt is
the result of artificially high interest rates on debt issues to Lebanese
banks,[25] graft that some suggest Lebanon's post-occupation government should
not be obligated to pay. In a country where most government revenue is eaten up
by debt servicing, the prospect of wiping a large portion of the national debt
off the books is very seductive. March 14 leaders can't allow such an audit, of
course, but this refusal essentially acknowledges that they have something to
hide (and, of course, much to lose if Lebanese banks don't get paid in full).
The Question of Hezbollah
In resisting the Hariri-Jumblatt coalition's bid for hegemony, the FPM has found
a strong ally in the Lebanese Shiite community, which got the short end of the
stick in Syrian-occupied Lebanon, both politically and economically.[26]
Hezbollah tacitly accepted the subordination of Shiites in Syrian-occupied
Lebanon (or, more precisely, expressed its objections only within certain
limits) in exchange for an exclusive right to organize armed resistance to the
Israelis in south Lebanon, an arrangement that not only served Syrian strategic
interests, but also channeled Shiite militancy away from the government.
Although Hezbollah joined the new government in 2005 (reportedly in exchange for
assurances regarding its military apparatus), it has remained staunchly opposed
to the March 14 coalition's hegemonic ambitions.
In February 2006, after weeks of committee-level negotiations, Aoun and
Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah signed a memorandum of
understanding that called for a broad range of reforms, from guaranteeing equal
media access for candidates to allowing expatriate voting, that would level the
slanted political playing field underlying the Hariri-Jumblatt coalition's grip
on power. The FPM-Hezbollah memorandum met with virtually unanimous assent in
the Shiite community and, according to poll by the Beirut Center for Research
and Information, 77% approval in the Christian community.[27]
Aoun's critics were quick to point out that the memorandum was fuzzy about the
question of Hezbollah's arms (although no more so than Hariri's public
statements on the issue) and accused him of backtracking on the issue in order
to boost his presidential bid. Aounists insist that the memorandum simply
skirted over the question of Hezbollah's arms in order to reach consensus on
domestic reform, which is the only thing that could conceivably induce it to
disarm. The overwhelming majority of Lebanese Shiites oppose demands for
Hezbollah's disarmament, not because they want jihad against Israel (though some
surely do), but because they see its military apparatus as a form of communal
compensation for being underprivileged.[28] They will not withdraw this consent
until the Shiite community has a partner in building the kind of Lebanon that
will be prosperous for all. Domestic reform may not make disarmament any more
palatable to Hezbollah leaders, but it will surely make the alternative less
sustainable politically.
The logic underlying this argument can be disputed on a number of different
grounds, but Aounists are quick to point out that the March 14 coalition doesn't
have any plan for domesticating Hezbollah. Even if the coalition was willing to
commit itself to the kind of reforms that might conceivably induce Hezbollah to
disarm, the Shiite community's deep mistrust of the governing elite could impede
compromise. In a sermon on March 24, Lebanon's most senior Shiite cleric, Sayyed
Muhammad Hussein Fadlallah, lambasted "thieves who made a fortune out of running
the country" and stressed that rebuilding the country requires people "with
clean plans and a clean history."[29]
Conclusion
In February, leading members of the March 14 coalition publicly vowed to force
Lahoud from office within a month. This pledge seemed to fly in the face of
political realities, as Lahoud had repeatedly insisted he would not step down,
while the FPM-Hezbollah accord appeared to negate the possibility of forcing his
departure constitutionally. March 14 leaders had tried to persuade Sfeir to
explicitly call for Lahoud's resignation, but without success.[30] Although the
patriarch would undoubtedly prefer to see a traditional Maronite political
leader ascend to the presidency, he has tried to appear neutral because he knows
the Christian street overwhelmingly supports Aoun.[31] There was some talk of
organizing demonstrations outside the presidential palace to pressure Lahoud
into resigning, but the idea was never seriously considered, as the FPM and
Hezbollah would have responded with much larger demonstrations.[32]
The sudden wave of optimism within the governing coalition stemmed not from
changes on the ground, but from developments outside of Lebanon. Following
Hariri's visit to the Washington in January, according to Lebanese media
reports, the Bush administration began working (through the Egyptians and
Saudis) to "convince Syrian President Bashar Assad to facilitate Lahoud's
exit,"[33] and the Beirut rumor mill was flush with rumors of an impending deal.
The one-month deadline came and passed with no resignation by Lahoud, however,
indicating that the Syrians were either unable or unwilling to step in. Although
the president is very close to Assad, he is not planning to spend his retirement
in Damascus - he is much more concerned with redeeming himself in the eyes of
Lebanese Christians, who would be even more outraged if he handed the office
over to a March 14 appointee, than on appeasing the Syrians.
The governing coalition has also been pressing the United States and France to
up the ante by sponsoring a UN Security Council resolution calling on Lebanon to
"hold presidential elections free of foreign influence." However, while American
and French officials tend to have a dim view of Aoun, most are reluctant to
intervene so forcefully in a Lebanese domestic dispute and some are beginning to
question whether there is a realistic alternative to Hariri sharing power with
the Aounists. With Iran and Syria on a collision course with the West and
sectarian animosities in the Arab world at a twenty-year high, bridging
differences within Lebanon is increasingly seen as a strategic imperative.
Notes
[1] Asked to name their favored presidential candidate in a recent poll by the
Beirut Center for Research and Information, Lebanese Christians responded as
follows: Michel Aoun (46.6%), Nassib Lahoud (12.1%), Boutros Harb (12.1%), Samir
Geagea (4.4%), Suleiman Frangieh (2.9%), Chibli Mallat (2.9%), Riad Salameh
(1.4%), no favorite (12.6%), others (7.1%). Al-Safir (Beirut), 2 March 2006. No
polling data is available on Aoun's support among Shiites, but anecdotal
evidence suggests that it is even more overwhelming. Together, Christians and
Shiites comprise 70% of the population as a whole.
[2] Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet (New York: Knopf, 1951).
[3] Volker Perthes, Myths and Money: Years of Hariri and Lebanon's Preparation
for a New Middle East, Middle East Report, No. 203, Spring 1997.
[4] The report was researched by a private company, Information International,
and commissioned by the United Nations Center for International Crime
Prevention. See "Lebanon loses 1.5 billion dollars annually to corruption: UN,"
Agence France Presse, 23 January 2001; The Daily Star (Beirut), 27 January 2001.
[5] "Official: Lebanese banks profiting from debt," The Daily Star, 3 April
2006.
[6] Guilain Denoeux and Robert Springborg, "Hariri's Lebanon: Singapore of the
Middle East or Sanaa of the Levant?" Middle East Policy, Vol. 6, No. 2, October
1998.
[7] Over 43 percent of companies surveyed in the report acknowledged that they
"always or very frequently" pay bribes. Some 40 percent said that they
"sometimes" do. See "Lebanon loses 1.5 billion dollars annually to corruption:
UN," Agence France Presse, 23 January 2001; The Daily Star (Beirut), 27 January
2001.
[8] Hariri spent over $2 billion, for example, in the early 1990s on a plan to
boost the country's power capacity from 800-1,000 megawatts to over 2,000
megawatts by rehabilitating or constructing ten power plants and their
accompanying grids. Not only was much of the money - over $500 million according
to one former minister - siphoned off in the process, but rampant profiteering
directed the remainder to redundant or ill-conceived projects. A decade later,
the Lebanese government was struggling to produce 1,400 megawatts of electricity
and rolling blackouts continue to plague the capital in summer months. "Amid
spectre of New York blackout, Lebanon fears plunge into darkness," Agence France
Presse, 15 August 2003.
[9] Ali and Nizar Dalloul, two sons of a former Lebanese defense minister, owned
86 percent of LibanCell. Najib Miqati, a close friend of Bashar Assad who served
as Lebanon's prime minister between April and June 2005, owned 30 percent of
Cellis. The rate in Lebanon was 13 cents a minute, compared to 3-8 cents in
other Arab countries. The Daily Star, Aug. 17, 2002.
[10] See "Lebanon without Hariri--who holds the lock and key?" Mideast Mirror, 1
December 1998.
[11] Although there are few reliable statistics on this, according to the World
Bank "income inequality is generally believed to have increased" during the
1990s. Lebanon: Country Brief, World Bank, September 2005.
[12] "There can be no doubt about the constitutionality of this government.
Article 53 states that the president appoints the ministers, 'one of whom he
chooses as prime minister'. The premier does not have to resign; the president
can dismiss him and appoint a new prime minister. Moreover, the Aoun government
kept the rules of the National Pact. If the presidency is vacant, the cabinet is
the sole executive . . . There was a precedent for this: in 1952, President
Beshara al-Khoury appointed the commander of the army, Fouad Chehab, who was a
Maronite, Prime Minister of an interim government." See Theodor Hanf,
Coexistence in Wartime Lebanon: Decline of a State and Rise of a Nation (London:
I.B. Tauris & Co Ltd, 1993), pp. 570-571.
[13] Elie A. Salem, Violence and Diplomacy in Lebanon (London: I.B. Tauris
Publishers, 1995), p. 272.
[14] See Judith Palmer Harik, "Between Islam and the System: Popular Support for
Lebanon's Hizballah," The Journal of Conflict Resolution (Vol. 40, No. 1), March
1996, p. 52.
[15] For example, former Oil Minister Shahe Barsoumian was jailed on charges of
embezzling some $800 million through the secret re-export of crude oil. Others
were indicted in connection with corruption schemes of similar magnitude at the
Council for Development and Reconstruction, the Environment Ministry, the Beirut
port, the National Bureau of Medicine, the Independent Municipal Fund, the
Directorate-General of Antiquities, the Ministry of Transportation, and the
Ministry of Electricity and Water resources.
[16] Al-Nahar (Beirut), 15 March 2001.
[17] See FNC Triumphs in Baabda-Aley, Middle East Intelligence Bulletin,
August-September 2003.
[18] Since various political factions wavered in and out of Syrian favor,
districts were re-gerrymandered by Syrian military intelligence before each
parliamentary election cycle, most recently in 2000.
[19] In north Lebanon, four predominantly Christian qadas were linked with three
Sunni Muslim qadas. In Baabda and Aley, Christian minorities are imbedded in
majority Druze districts. Christian towns in south Lebanon are subsumed within
Shiite majority districts.
[20] "It is out of the question to hold elections under such conditions," Sfeir
declared on May 12. "Lebanon opposition to set up committee to save polls,"
Agence France Presse, 12 May 2005.
[21] Hariri reportedly paid the bail for four Sunni Islamist terrorists who had
been arrested in September 2004 for plotting to bomb the Ukrainian and Italian
embassies in Lebanon and sent Siniora to personally attend a celebration where
they were welcomed after their release. Al-Safir (Beirut), 18 June 2005. The
Sunni mufti of Tripoli, Taha Sabonji, and numerous other Sunni clerics in north
Lebanon openly called upon their followers to vote for Hariri's list (an
unprecedented act for clergy of any Lebanese sect). One of the first acts of
Lebanon's new parliament was the passage of an amnesty law freeing over two
dozen suspected Sunni Islamist terrorists (seven had been detained for plotting
to bomb the Ukrainian and Italian embassies in September 2004; twenty-six of the
detainees were captured in 1999 during a brief, but bloody, Sunni Islamist
uprising that left 40 people dead).
[22] Daniel Pepper, Another Sunday in Beirut, 5 February 2006.
[23] Syrian officials deny that any are still held, but local human rights
groups have compiled an exhaustive collection of evidence (e.g. eyewitness
testimonies of returning prisoners) indicating that over three hundred Lebanese
who were definitely alive and in Syrian custody at some point are still
unaccounted for.
[24] Interview with author, this issue of Mideast Monitor.
[25] Kamal Dib, "A strategy to investigate Lebanese corruption and debt," The
Daily Star, 14 June 2005.
[26] Although Shiites comprise over a third of the population, the constitution
bars them from the two highest government offices and allots them only 21% of
parliamentary seats. Moreover, the Syrians refused to allow competitive
elections for these seats, forcing Hezbollah to share joint slates with Amal and
other favored Shiite clients. Shiites also suffered disproportionately in
socio-economic terms as Hariri's policies widened income inequalities. Syrian
workers in Lebanon pushed the Shiite urban poor out of the unskilled labor
market, while smuggling of cheap Syrian produce in the country drove destitute
Shiite farmers into bankruptcy.
[27] Al-Diyar (Beirut), 11 February 2006.
[28] Amal Saad-Ghorayeb, "Hizbullah's arms and Shiite empowerment," The Daily
Star (Beirut), 22 August 2005.
[29] "Fadlallah warns against non-Lebanese 'solutions'," The Daily Star, 25
March 2006.
[30] On March 1, the Council of Maronite Bishops declared, "the president is the
only one who can judge if his staying on or his departure is useful to the
country." The Daily Star, 2 March 2006.
[31] In an interview in February with the daily Al-Safir, he did say it would be
better if the next president was not a "military man." However, the newspaper
immediately posted a clarification on its web site (and in its next issue)
saying that when asked specifically about Aoun, Sfeir replied "some say the
military man is gone with the wind . . . and what remains is a civilian
citizen." See Al-Safir (Beirut), 21 February 2006. "Sfeir voices support for
peaceful removal of President Lahoud," The Daily Star, 22 February 2006.
[32] "If they think they can topple Lahoud by sending public protests to Baabda
Presidential Palace, they should know that we can send protests to the Grand
Serail," said Aoun, referring to the seat of the premiership. See "Sfeir Slams
Political Bickering," The Daily Star, 27 February 2006.
[33] "Rice's visit confirms U.S. support for Lahoud to go," The Daily Star, 25
February 2006.
© 2006 Mideast Monitor. All rights reserved