The March 14 forces lauded the statement of Dar al-Fatwa, saying it conforms with the principles of all Lebanese that seek to defend their country’s democratic system and the Taef agreement.

During a meeting of several March 14 officials at Center House in downtown Beirut on Friday, the conferees said the Dar al-Fatwa’s statement “conforms with the principles of all Lebanese in defense of the democratic system, the Taef accord, the international tribunal, Lebanon’s independence and the sovereignty of the state.”

Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblat has hinted that he was frustrated from the latest meeting of Lebanon's highest Sunni Muslim authority.

Sunni council Dar al-Fatwa on Thursday warned the next cabinet against abandoning the international tribunal investigating the 2005 murder of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

Premier-designate Najib Miqati is mulling to form a 24-member “strong cabinet” through “silent diplomacy,” the billionaire businessman and his circles told An Nahar newspaper.

Miqati said in remarks published Saturday that he was seeking to form “a strong cabinet that would launch a relentless work through competent ministers.”

Six years after Rafik Hariri's assassination galvanized Lebanon, sparking mass protests seen in Beirut as a model for Egypt's uprising, his legacy is faltering in a country torn by a U.N. probe of the murder.

The camp of outgoing Prime Minister Saad Hariri, son of the slain five-time premier, has since "suffered a number of setbacks," said Asaad AbuKhalil, professor at California State University and author of a political blog.

The President of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, Antonio Cassese, denied in a statement a report alleging that he tried to convince permanent members of the U.N. Security Council of the necessity of Prosecutor Daniel Bellemare's resignation.

He said in a statement that he "categorically denies these allegations and regards this report as part of a campaign to create artificial divisions within the Tribunal."

Former Premier Omar Karami on Friday lashed out at Prime Minister-designate Najib Miqati and ridiculed him for being a centrist.

"Centrism has no color or taste," Karami told Miqati in an interview with Al-Jadid television channel.

Celebratory gunfire rang out in Lebanon as the world cheered the exit of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.

Hizbullah, meanwhile, congratulated Egyptians on their "historic victory" following Mubarak's decision to step down, as car horns blared and fireworks went off in Beirut.

A source from the March 8 camp revealed on Friday that Syria is trying to revitalize the pro-Syrian Lebanese parties' roles in the new Lebanese government.

It told the Central News Agency that the Syrian leadership hoped that Prime Minister-designate Najib Miqati would appoint MP Ali Qanso as a minister representing the Syrian Social National Party, MP Qassem Hashem as a minister from the Baath party, and Osama Saad as a minister from the Nasserite organization.

Caretaker Energy Minister Jebran Bassil on Friday signed the fuel price list without raising the cost of gasoline to consumers.

A statement issued by the Energy Ministry said Bassil kept gasoline prices of all grades the same.

The Orient has long held a fascination for westerners, conjuring up exotic images from historic lands where few travelers ventured before the advent of trains and steamboats.

As a child in the 1950s French couturier Christian Lacroix recalls the inscription on a monument in the port of Marseilles, "Gateway to the East" was enough to fire his imagination and later inspire his designs.