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Huge crowds gather for funeral of slain Lebanon minister
By Steve Kirby
AFP
BEIRUT
Petroleumworld.com 11 23 06
The centre of Beirut was a sea of red and white flags Thursday as Lebanon put on a show of patriotism for the funeral of the latest outspoken opponent of neighbouring Syria to be assassinated.
Hours before the lunchtime funeral at the Maronite St George Cathedral, tens of thousands of people were already gathering in the nearby Martyrs' Square, many of them bused in from the provinces in huge convoys.
Lebanese troops, backed by armoured vehicles, were out in force across the capital for the funeral of Industry Minister Pierre Gemayel, the sixth critic of Syria to be assassinated in the past two years.
The anti-Damascus politicians who run the government were quick to point the finger at Syria, and had called for a huge show of public determination to be rid of the meddling of its larger neighbour.
The leader of the anti-Syrian majority in parliament, Saad Hariri, who himself lost his father to an assassin's bomb last year, called on people across the nation to attend the funeral in a "show of support for freedom and independence".
Ahead of the funeral, convoys of cars plastered with portraits of Gemayel and Hariri toured the streets of Beirut playing patriotic music.
Mourners in the city centre vented their anger at Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his Lebanese allies -- President Emile Lahoud and Shiite militant group Hezbollah.
"Kick Bashar's agent out of Baabda," they chanted, referring to the presidential place.
"We want only the army to bear weapons," they called, referring to Hezbollah's persistent refusal to lay down its weapons in accordance with UN Security Council resolutions after its devastating summer war with Israel.
Martyrs' Square was where an estimated million people gathered in March last year after the assassination of five-time prime minister Rafiq Hariri.
"In tragedy, Beirut is renewing its spring," read the front-page headline in the French-language daily L'Orient-Le Jour.
Gemayel, 34, scion of one of Lebanon's leading Christian families, will be buried in his home village of Bikfaya in the mountains east of Beirut, where his coffin was taken Wednesday.
His body was brought back to the capital Thursday ahead of the 1:00 pm (1100 GMT) funeral, with the cortege struggling to make its way through huge crowds.
Gemayel's father, Amin, himself a former president, called for the funeral to pass off "calmly".
Security around the capital has been boosted since the minister's murder, with extra roadblocks around the presidential palace and on the main highway to Damascus.
High command sources told the pro-Syrian Al-Akhbar newspaper that the army "remains neutral" in Lebanon's political disputes and will continue to protect all state institutions, including the official residence of the pro-Syrian president.
French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy and Arab League chief Amr Mussa were among the foreign dignitaries due to attend the funeral and show their support for the Lebanese government.
Douste-Blazy made little secret of his own suspicions of Syrian involvement Wednesday, even if he held back from apportioning blame for Tuesday's killing of Gemayel.
"Obviously I will avoid designating the guilty party at this stage, even if after this new murder, following so many others, each of us has an opinion," he told France Info radio.
His comments earned him the wrath of Syria and its regional ally Iran, who strongly deny any involvement in the killings.
Damascus stressed that the timing of Gemayel's murder, on the day the United Nations endorsed a blueprint for a tribunal to try suspects in the February 2005 murder of Hariri, was designed to cause it maximum damage.
The governing anti-Syrian camp in Beirut, faced with a growing challenge from Hezbollah since its war with Israel, is the only party which stands to gain from the minister's assassination, the official press in Damascus argued.
Lebanon's acting interior minister Ahmed Fatfat retorted sarcastically: "Yes, we are suicidal people."
Britain, which has been pressing the United States to open talks with Syria and Iran on stabilising Iraq, took a more guarded approach to the question of Syrian involvement, insisting the jury was still out.
"We genuinely don't know who was responsible for this act," said a spokesman for Prime Minister Tony Blair.
The UN Security Council on Wednesday directed UN investigators to provide Beirut with technical help in investigating Gemayel's murder at the request of Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Siniora.
A UN commission of inquiry has been investigating Hariri's murder and has implicated a number of senior Syrian officials and their Lebanese allies.
AFP 23 0934 GMT 11 06
Copyright© 2006 AFP. All Rights Reserved.
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