The leaders of Syria and Saudi Arabia met Sunday to discuss rising tension in Lebanon that threatens to break apart that country’s coalition government and spark unrest in one of the most volatile corners of the Middle East.
The official Saudi news agency reported that the talks between Syrian President Bashar Assad and Saudi King Abdullah bin Abdel-Aziz touched on the tensions over the investigation into the killing of former Premier Rafik Hariri but gave no details.
Apart from the faltering peace talks, the two leaders were also expected to have discussed the stalemate over the formation of a government in Iraq, more than seven months after an inconclusive parliamentary election.
Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri was in Saudi Arabia on a family visit Sunday but did not join the talks.
Syria and Saudi Arabia back opposing factions in Lebanon and are concerned that a UN tribunal’s investigation of the assassination of former Prime Hariri could split its shaky governing coalition.
Rafik Hariri was killed in a massive truck bombing in Beirut in February 2005 that many in Lebanon blamed on Syria. Syria denies involvement.
Saudi Arabia was close to the slain former premier and supports political forces loyal to his son, Saad, who is Lebanon’s current prime minister. Syria, which dominated Lebanon for decades, backs Hizbullah, the powerful group that shares power in Lebanon’s government.
The UN tribunal, better known as The Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL), is expected to indict Hizbullah members this year, raising concerns of possible violence between the Shiite force and Hariri, a Sunni, and his allies.
Sunday’s meeting in the Saudi capital reflected growing cooperation between the one-time bitter rivals.
Assad’s second trip to the world’s top oil exporting country this year is the latest sign of a thaw in bilateral relations. In July, Abdullah and Assad sought to put the enmity to rest and traveled together to Beirut to address the rising discord there.
While Saudi Arabia and Syria try to defuse tension in Lebanon they so far remain at odds over the legitimacy of the STL. Riyadh has long supported the Hague-based court.
Syria, initially implicated by UN investigators in the bombing that killed Hariri, has always viewed the tribunal as politically motivated. Syrian officials say any indictments of Hizbullah would be considered to be targeting Syria too.
Hizbullah, meanwhile, has denounced the UN-backed court and called on Hariri to repudiate the tribunal.
The Saudis might ask Assad to restrain Hizbullah, Dubai political analyst Theodore Karasik said.
“Keeping a lid on Lebanon’s political factions is especially critical in the current security environment,” he said.
Hizbullah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said in July that Hariri had told him the tribunal would indict “rogue” members of the party for his father’s killing.
Mustafa Alani, a regional security expert at the Gulf Research Center in Dubai, said there was “a major crisis over the future of the international court on the Hariri case.”
While Hariri has offered to play down any indictment linked to his rivals Hizbullah and focus only on the individuals involved, Hizbullah has demanded the tribunal be discredited.
“I think what they [Abdullah and Assad] have managed so far is to keep a lid on quite alarming rising tensions in the Lebanese community,” said Salman Shaikh, director of the Brookings Doha Center think-tank.
“I don’t think it’s in the interest of either these two countries or others for Lebanon to erupt into conflagration,” he said, adding that they could try to limit the fallout from indictments in the Hariri murder case. –Agencies
No comments:
Post a Comment