AP News, December 13th, 2007
One day after a car bombing killed a top Lebanese military leader, President Bush said Thursday that interference by Syria and its allies "aimed at intimidating the Lebanese people" must stop.
A car bombing on Wednesday killed Brig. Gen. Francois Hajj, a candidate to become head of the army who had led the three-month military campaign that crushed al-Qaida-inspired militants. There was no claim of responsibility and widespread speculation over the motive for the attack. Some blamed Islamic extremists, while others said Syria was behind it.
However, Syria's foreign minister has condemned the bombing.
Bush refrained from directly blaming Syria.
But he noted that, like other victims in a string of assassinations of prominent anti-Syrian figures in Lebanon since 2005, Wednesday's attack targeted someone who was "a supporter of Lebanon's independence and an opponent of Syria's interference in Lebanon's internal affairs."
He called the attacks a "systematic campaign of murder against Lebanon's most ardent patriots."
"As Lebanon seeks to select a president democratically and in accordance with its constitution, interference by the Syrian regime and its allies, aimed at intimidating the Lebanese people, must end," Bush said in a statement. "The people of Lebanon deserve the opportunity to choose their leaders in freedom and without fear."
Lebanon's politicians remain deadlocked over electing the next president. The failure to elect a president since September has embroiled Lebanon in its worst political crisis since the end of the 1975-90 civil war. Fears are rising that a power vacuum could lead to violence.
The plotters in the political assassinations have never been identified. But anti-Syrian politicians who back Lebanon's government have accused Damascus of involvement, a claim Syria has denied.
