Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat has slammed the referendum held in Syria on a new constitution for the revolt-hit country, noting that a Yemen-style solution was the best to resolve the crisis.
“Wretched are those days when constitutional theatricals are being held over the remains of bodies and amid the roar of cannons and the sound of bullets,” Jumblat said in a weekly column in his party’s al-Anbaa newspaper to be published Tuesday.

Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi on Sunday stressed the importance of “broadening bilateral ties with Lebanon, particularly in the defense field,” during talks with Defense Minister Fayez Ghosn in Tehran, the Iranian news agency ISNA reported.
Ghosn and Salehi discussed bilateral, regional and international issues, it said.

Grand Mufti Sheikh Mohammed Rashid Qabbani headed on Monday an urgent meeting of Sunni religious scholars after a controversy erupted over his call for the elections of the Higher Islamic Council on April 22.
A statement issued after the meeting held at Dar al-Fatwa said the conferees stressed “the importance of the Islamic and national role of the Mufti … in unifying the Muslims and Lebanese.”

Two Syrian teenagers were kidnapped from their home in the area of Karak near the eastern city of Zahle at dawn Monday, their mother claimed.
Jumana Izzeddine, a Syrian national, told security forces that several armed men broke into her house and kidnapped her sons Baraa, 16 and 14-year-old Ali.

Hizbullah on Monday denied media reports claiming that party officials had tried in vain to mediate to prevent security forces from seizing arms from the home of a party member in Beirut’s southern suburbs.
“Nizar al-Husseini is neither an official nor a member in the party,” Hizbullah’s media relations unit said in a statement.

President Michel Suleiman stressed on Monday during a cabinet session that constructive dialogue is the only solution to resolve problems as Prime Minister Najib Miqati called for a productive government.
The cabinet reconvened for the first time in almost four weeks and in the presence of newly appointed Labor Minister Salim Jreissati.

The premier’s office didn’t receive yet any official information on the appointment of Deputy Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia Norman Farrell as Special Tribunal for Lebanon Prosecutor to replace judge Daniel Bellemare.
“Prime Minister (Najib Miqati) didn’t receive yet the STL’s decision,” the premier’s sources told An Nahar newspaper on Monday.

A meeting chaired by Speaker Nabih Berri of parliament’s bureau and heads and rapporteurs of parliamentary committees on Monday will test his ability to resolve the dispute between the March 8 and 14 forces on extra-budgetary spending.
A parliamentary source told al-Liwaa daily that discussions will focus on the agenda of the March 5 parliamentary session and the possibility to launch the work of a joint legislative-ministerial committee to resolve the controversial spending.

Speaker Nabih Berri is preparing for a conference set to gather the religious leaders of different sects in Lebanon and the region to stress the importance of dialogue among all religions.
According to An Nahar newspaper published on Monday, the conference will tackle the issue of reducing emigration due to confessional causes.

Defense Minister Fayez Ghosn stressed Sunday that “Lebanon’s people, army and resistance are an invincible fortress in the face of Israel,” noting that the Lebanese "will never forget that Iran stood by them in great difficulties," during talks with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Tehran.
Ghosn also said that Israel would fear Iran's reaction, should it consider moving in a hostile way against any regional country.
