Phalange leader Amin Gemayel has reportedly said that his party would not engage in dialogue with representatives of Hizbullah who consider the four suspects accused of involvement in ex-Premier Rafik Hariri’s Feb. 2005 murder as “saints.”

An Nahar daily said Wednesday that Gemayel made his remarks to President Michel Suleiman the day before after the president launched consultations to inquire about the politicians’ viewpoints on his invitation for national dialogue.

Prime Minister Najib Miqati has denounced the roadside bombing that targeted the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) in the southern city of Sidon.

Miqati contacted Interior Minister Marwan Charbel and Justice Minister Shakib Qortbawi on Tuesday.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and the Security Council strongly condemned the attack against a convoy of vehicles carrying members of the United Nations peacekeeping force near the southern city of Sidon in which five soldiers were wounded.

Ban “deeply disturbed” by the attack targeting the U.N. Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), according to a statement issued by his spokesperson Martin Nesirky.

The United States strongly condemned an attack on the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon, saying the Lebanese government should conduct a "full investigation" into the roadside bombing.

State Department spokeswoman Heide Fulton said on Tuesday that the government should "ensure the perpetrators are swiftly brought to justice."

U.S. Federal authorities said they have found fresh evidence of growing cooperation between the drug trade and “terrorists” in a probe of two major overseas networks of narcotics dealers.

The investigations resulted in the arrests of four men, U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said at a news conference on Tuesday.

French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe condemned with "greatest firmness" the attack that targeted French U.N. peacekeepers in a roadside bombing in the southern city of Sidon.

Juppe called on the Lebanese authorities on Tuesday to "do everything necessary to bring the perpetrators to justice."

Hizbullah Secretary-General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah on Tuesday warned Israel against stealing Lebanon’s maritime resources, vowing that his party will retaliate against any attack on Lebanon’s future oil and gas installations.

“I confidently say to all the countries, governments and companies that will submit tenders in order to start oil excavation that Lebanon is capable of protecting these companies and oil and gas installations,” Nasrallah said in a televised speech on the fifth anniversary of the July 2006 war.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad held talks Tuesday in Damascus with Lebanon’s Energy and Water Minister Jebran Bassil on the situations in Lebanon following the formation of the new government and the Syrian-Lebanese relations, Syria’s official news agency SANA reported.

Talks also dealt with the situation in Syria and the region, SANA added.

The Mustaqbal bloc noted on Tuesday that the recent positions of Hizbullah and March 8 officials over President Michel Suleiman’s possible call for dialogue revealed that they are seeking to eliminate the results of the talks even before they are held.

It said in a statement after its weekly meeting: “Hizbullah rejected dialogue over its possession of arms … It appears that it has forgotten that the resistance weapons that liberated the South have lost their legitimacy after they were turned against fellow Lebanese and after they harbored the accused in the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.”

Five French soldiers serving with the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) were wounded on Tuesday, one seriously, in a roadside bomb attack in the southern city of Sidon, a UNIFIL spokesman told Agence France Presse.

"According to preliminary reports, at around 6:00 pm today (1500 GMT) an explosion targeted a UNIFIL convoy along the highway at Sidon," said UNIFIL spokesman Neeraj Singh.