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Lebanese rally to mark Hariri's death
(Reuters)
Updated: 2006-02-15 09:26
Popular Mourning
"We miss you," read large posters of Hariri. "They feared you, so they killed
you," others said. "He lived Lebanon and died for its sake," a black banner
read.
"I came here to say that the terrorist Syrian regime that kills will never
escape punishment," Amal Yassin, a mother of three, told Reuters as she waved a
red-and-white Lebanese flag.
Security officials estimated the crowd at 500,000. The rally's organisers and
allied acting interior minister put the number at over 1 million, more than a
quarter of Lebanon's 4 million people. All schools, shops, banks and businesses
in the country were shut for the occasion.
However, Shi'ite Muslims, led by the Syrian- and Iranian-backed Hizbollah
group, largely stayed away.
Thousands of Lebanese soldiers and police were deployed in Beirut and its
suburbs as people converged from across Lebanon on Martyrs' Square, the central
area where Hariri is buried.
A violent protest earlier this month against cartoons of the Prophet
Mohammad, in which the Danish mission was burnt and a church vandalised,
underlined the need for vigilance.
A U.N. inquiry has implicated senior Syrian security officials and their
Lebanese allies in Hariri's killing.
Four pro-Syrian generals have been detained and charged with involvement, but
no indictments have been issued.
One poster carried the pictures of the four and that of Lahoud above the
caption: "Four down, one to go".
The killing of Hariri, a billionaire construction tycoon and prime minister
for a total of 10 years between 1992 and 2004, galvanised world support for
Lebanon and put pressure on Syria.
Since the Syrian pullout in April, Lebanon has suffered a series of bombings
and the assassination of three anti-Syrian figures. Recurrent political crises
and the resurfacing of sectarian tensions have raised fears of further
instability.
Rice cited an "urgent need for Syria's full and complete cooperation" with
the U.N. investigation. She hailed the legacy of Hariri and said he symbolised
Lebanon's resilience after decades of civil war and turmoil and its
determination to rebuild itself into a democratic and prosperous nation.
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