Spotlight
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Lebanon UNIFIL vehicle torched as Hezbollah supporters block airport road anew A vehicle emblazoned with the logo of the U.N. peacekeeping force in Lebanon was torched late Friday as supporters of Hezbollah again blocked the r... 1
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Lebanon Hariri hints at return to politics, urges Shiite Duo not to be 'obstruction force' In a speech to a crowd of supporters at his father's tomb on Friday, ex-PM Saad Hariri stopped short of announcing a return to politics, but did ...
Mufti Sheikh Mohammed Rashid Qabbani said Sunday that the Special Tribunal for Lebanon should not be part of the political bickering because it is a legitimate institution established by a U.N. Security Council resolution.
“This court is an institution that has international legitimacy from a Security Council resolution that established it. That’s why it should be left out of the political rhetoric,” Qabbani said in a statement.

A document aired on al-Manar TV allegedly proving that U.N. investigators probing ex-Premier Rafik Hariri’s murder case had transferred IT equipment to Israel is baseless, a legal expert hinted to An Nahar daily published Sunday.
The expert said that the document, which was aired during a televised speech made by Hizbullah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah on Saturday night, has a UNTSO stamp.

“What should I say, everything is clear,” said Judge Wael Murtada after receiving a death threat, An Nahar newspaper reported Sunday.
The daily said that the threat came in the form of a bullet stuck to his vehicle’s window with a message: “Death for you.”

The third alleged CIA agent that has confessed to spying on Hizbullah is a cadre in the Shiite party’s telecommunications network, al-Mustaqbal daily reported Sunday.
Last month, Hizbullah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah announced that members of his group had confessed to being CIA agents and accused Israel of turning to the U.S. spy agency when it failed to infiltrate his party.

A French official has said that he would ask Lebanese Justice Minister Shakib Qortbawi to exert all efforts to cooperate with the international tribunal “no matter what the price might be.”
Francois Zimeray, who is France’s Ambassador for Human Rights, said in remarks published in the Saudi al-Watan daily on Sunday that he would ask Qortbawi “about the future intentions on the international court and how Lebanon would cooperate with it.”

March 14 general-secretariat coordinator Fares Soaid has said that Hizbullah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah’s keenness on the cabinet proves that the arms of the Shiite party have taken the country captive.
“The keenness that the man showed on the cabinet of Premier Najib Miqati confirms once again that Hizbullah puts the entire Lebanese republic under the captivity of its arms,” Soaid told An Nahar daily published Sunday.

Speaker Nabih Berri has said that Beirut was as calm as Norway’s capital Oslo when the Special Tribunal for Lebanon handed General Prosecutor Saeed Mirza a copy of the indictment in ex-Premier Rafik Hariri’s assassination case.
In remarks to An Nahar daily published Sunday, Berri said that Shiites proved their “commitment to the instructions of the political and religious leaderships and were not shocked by the accusations against the four people.”

Hizbullah Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah on Saturday ruled out the arrest of four members of his party indicted by the Special Tribunal for Lebanon for the 2005 assassination of Lebanese former premier Rafik Hariri.
In his first reaction to the charges by the STL, Nasrallah also rejected "each and every void accusation" made by the Netherlands-based court, which he said was heading for a trial in absentia.

The premiership received on Saturday Minister Talal Arslan’s written resignation from cabinet, reported LB television.
President Michel Suleiman and Prime Minister Najib Miqati will discuss this issue on Monday.

The head of the Loyalty to the Resistance bloc MP Mohammed Raad linked on Saturday the release of the indictment in the investigation into the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri to the formation of the new government.
“They were surprised with the cabinet lineup and they consequently had not choice but to release the indictment,” he said during an academic gathering.
