Lebanese cabinet includes Hezbollah member
(Agencies)
Updated: 2005-07-20 09:09

Lebanon's prime minister-designate announced his new Cabinet on Tuesday, a government dominated by opponents of Syria but including a member of the militant Hezbollah group, which Washington brands a terrorist organization.

The 24-member Cabinet, the first since Syria withdrew its troops from Lebanon, omits prominent Christian representation of followers of former Gen. Michel Aoun.

The formation of the new government concludes almost three weeks of political squabbling over key posts. Pro-Syrian President Emile Lahoud repeatedly demanded changes in Prime Minister-designate Fuad Saniora's suggested lineups.

Saniora said he was "proud" his Cabinet includes lawmaker Mohammed Fneish from the Shiite Muslim group Hezbollah, which continues to stage guerrilla assaults against Israel in a disputed border area in southern Lebanon.

"I think this is an excellent thing for Hezbollah to have a presence in this government," he said. "This is very natural. They are part of this country and consequently they have a right to have representatives in this government."

He said his Cabinet would work toward improving relations with Syria, which have suffered since the withdrawal.

Washington reaction was swift. State Department spokesman Adam Ereli said the United States will have no dealings with any Lebanese Cabinet minister who is a member of Hezbollah but that there would be no impediment to working with the entire Lebanese government.

Aoun, the former army commander who returned to Lebanon from 14 years of exile in France, had wanted the Justice portfolio but was refused. It went instead to Lahoud ally Charles Rizk.

Hezbollah's Mohammed Fneish received the power and hydraulic resources ministry, while the militant group's ally, Tarrad Hamadeh, retained the post of labor minister.

The key Foreign Ministry went to Shiite Fawzi Salloukh after negotiations with Hezbollah and its rival Amal movement. Salloukh is a former veteran diplomat who served for more than three decades with the foreign corps. He does not belong to either group but was acceptable to both.

The new administration also includes ministers close to the president, including his son-in-law, former Defense Minister Elias Murr, who survived an assassination attempt June 12. He retains the Defense portfolio.

Most other posts in the Cabinet, which includes 12 Christians and 12 Muslims per Lebanon's sectarian political system, went to members of lawmaker Saad Hariri's Future Movement and his allies. Hariri, son of former slain Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, emerged as the major winner in parliamentary elections in May and June.

Syria was forced to withdraw its troop from Lebanon after Hariri's Feb. 14 assassination, which triggered anti-Damascus protests in Beirut. The opposition blamed Syria and its agents in Lebanon for his murder, a charge Syria denies.

Lahoud had delayed the Cabinet's formation becayse it did not include proper Christian representation.

Cardinal Nasrallah Sfeir, head of the influential Maronite Church, on Sunday refused to bless Saniora's list because it included no Aoun supporters, Lahoud media adviser Rafik Shalala said.

Saniora, a former finance minister, presented Lahoud a Cabinet list on Friday that included no representatives from Aoun's 21-member parliamentary bloc.

Lahoud apparently wanted Aoun, who lost a "war of liberation" against the Syrian army in Lebanon in 1989 before going into exile in France, included in the Cabinet and opposed some Maronite Christians put forward.

Aoun, who returned after Syria ended its 29-year military presence, also rejected Saniora's list because none of his supporters was included.

Separately Tuesday, the president signed an amnesty pardoning anti-Syrian Christian warlord Samir Geagea and nearly three dozen Muslim militants, some with alleged al-Qaida links. Lebanon's parliament had approved the amnesty Monday.

Geagea, behind bars since 1994, has been linked with some of Lebanon's most notorious civil war-era killings, including the 1987 bombing of a military helicopter that killed pro-Syrian Prime Minister Rashid Karami.

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