Syria ready for Lebanon pullout

DAMASCUS - The presidents of Syria and Lebanon are meeting to work out a two-phased Syrian troop withdrawal from Lebanon expected to begin very soon.
Lebanon's defence minister said the withdrawal would start immediately after the end of the talks on Monday in Damascus between Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and Lebanon's Emile Lahoud.

Lebanese officials said the two leaders were expected to approve the plan. A joint military committee would then meet and begin implementing the first stage, involving a military pullback to the Bekaa Valley in eastern Lebanon.

Assad and Lahoud were also set to fix a timeline, at least for the first stage of the pull-out, officials in Beirut said.

Facing intense international pressure, Assad announced plans on Saturday for a complete withdrawal of troops from Lebanon but said Damascus would still play a role in its smaller neighbour.

The United States has been wary of Assad's plans. The White House promised on Sunday to step up pressure for a complete and immediate withdrawal of Syrian troops and security services.

"The international community is not going to stand by and let Assad continue to have these kind of half-measures," said White House counsellor Dan Bartlett.

But Lebanon's most powerful and only armed party, Hizbollah, called for peaceful protests on Tuesday in support of Syria and warned of mayhem if Syrian troops were to leave.

"The aim of America and Israel is to spread chaos in Lebanon and ... to find excuses for foreign intervention," Hizbollah chief Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah told a news conference on Sunday.

Set up by Iran's Revolutionary Guard in 1982, Shi'ite Muslim Hizbollah is the only Lebanese faction to keep its guns. It gained wide popularity after helping drive Israeli troops from south Lebanon in 2000. Washington says it is a terrorist group.

US DEMANDS

Washington has demanded that Syria relinquish its political and military grip on Lebanon before elections expected in May.

"I don't think there could be a scenario in which there could be a real, truly free and fair election with a Syrian presence continuing to have an intimidation factor in Lebanon," Bartlett said.

US President George W. Bush is considering new unilateral sanctions, including freezing Syrian assets, US officials say, and Washington is discussing "next steps" with European allies.

Assad said Syrian troops would withdraw to the Bekaa Valley and then to the border area in line with the Taif Accord.

The 1989 Taif Accord ended Lebanon's 1975-90 civil war and stipulated the withdrawal of Syrian troops from most of the country within two years.

Syria has sidestepped implementing September's United Nations Security Council Resolution 1559, which called for foreign troops to quit Lebanon completely, but has said compliance with the Taif Accord amounted to much the same thing.

Saudi Arabian Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal, whose country urged Assad last week to start withdrawing troops, welcomed Syria's weekend announcement.

"What is required of the Lebanese is that they not give a chance for any troublemaker to return to Lebanon," Prince Saud told Al Arabiya satellite television.

Lebanese media said Syria's pledge to withdraw was a historic move opening a new chapter after 30 years of Syrian domination. Lebanon's opposition and European leaders cautiously described the move as positive.

Syria has been in Lebanon since intervening in the civil war in 1976 and now has some 14,000 troops there, down from 40,000.

Damascus came under growing Lebanese, Arab and wider pressure to withdraw its forces after the assassination last month of former Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri. Syria denied accusations that it had a hand in the Beirut bombing.

Hizbollah, whose guerrillas control Lebanon's southern border, said it had no intention of laying down its weapons -- the UN resolution demands that the Lebanese army extend its control throughout the country's territory.

"The resistance will not give up its arms ... because Lebanon needs the resistance to defend it," Nasrallah said.

- REUTERS