Defense lawyers before the U.N.-backed court probing former Lebanese premier Rafik Hariri's murder sought Wednesday to have the tribunal's creation declared illegal and unfit to judge their clients.

Lawyers for Salim Ayyash -- one of four men wanted for trial in connection with Hariri's car bomb death in 2005 -- asked "the trial chamber to find that the establishment of the court was not legal."

The March 14 General Secretariat condemned on Wednesday the government’s failure to cater to the needs of the Syrian refugees in Lebanon, accusing it of imposing a military and security siege against them.

It announced in a statement after its weekly meeting that it will lead a delegation to visit the town of Arsal later this week “in order to break the siege and reject the government’s decision to distance itself from the refugees’ needs.”

A 70-year-old Lebanese woman was killed on Wednesday in a cross-border fire in eastern Lebanon’s al-Qaa village, the National News Agency reported.

Halima Suleiman Krombi was shot in the head and taken to Hermel state hospital, NNA said. But she later died from her wounds.

Premier Najib Miqati warned on Wednesday that the path to democracy is not an easy task, saying Lebanon is still improving its democratic system despite being a harbinger of freedom in the Arab world.

At the opening of the 27th ministerial session of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA), Miqati said: “The uprisings and the popular movements demanding democracy are part of the historic development in the Arab region.”

Special Tribunal for Lebanon Pre-Trial Judge Daniel Fransen has determined that 58 of the 73 victims of the February 14, 2005 attack who applied to do so can now participate in the Ayyash et al. proceedings, announced the STL in a statement on Wednesday.

“Fransen has reviewed the 73 victim applications he has received, 15 of which were deemed to be incomplete,” it added.

Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat will enter in an alliance with the March 14 forces in the upcoming 2013 elections, As Safir newspaper reported on Wednesday.

Sources told the daily that Jumblat’s meeting with U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Jeffrey Feltman during his latest visit to Beirut focused on the upcoming 2013 polls.

President Michel Suleiman is reportedly fed up with the pressure exerted on him to sign the controversial $5.9 billion extra-budgetary spending bill and the campaign launched against him by Free Patriotic Movement leader Michel Aoun.

Baabda palace visitors told An Nahar daily on Wednesday that Suleiman was “fed up” after Aoun reiterated his accusations that the president was causing a paralysis in state institutions by refusing to sign the bill.

Electricite du Liban's contract employees held a sit-in on Wednesday for the second day in a row near the company’s building in Beirut and the southern city of Tyre.

The employees blocked the highway near the Beirut port and Tyre’s entrance by burning tires to protest the cabinet’s failure to approve their full-time employment draft law.

Speaker Nabih Berri considered on Wednesday that some constitutional authorities have been given to the head of state to resolve financial issues, hinting that President Michel Suleiman is refusing to use his jurisdictions to resolve the dispute over the $5.9 billion spending of 2011.

“The executive power should resolve the extra-budgetary spending dispute,” Berri told As Safir newspaper.

Premier Najib Miqati sought on Tuesday to convince the government’s different parties of a new plan aimed at ending the bickering on the $5.9 billion extra-budgetary spending of 2011, An Nahar daily reported.

The newspaper said Wednesday that Miqati sought to avoid a clash during the cabinet session between the March 8 ministers and President Michel Suleiman who is rejecting to sign the bill under article 58 of the constitution that allows the head of state to approve a bill deemed urgent by the government after the failure of the legislature to approve it.