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Beirut: Lebanon's parliament is likely to delay electing a president this week because no compromise candidate has been found by rival pro- and anti-Syrian groups, an official said yesterday.
It would be the second postponement in electing a president, a hurdle to resolving an 11-month crisis pitting the anti-Syrian ruling majority against the pro-Syrian opposition.
It is the worst crisis since the 1975-1990 civil war and there are concerns that if no president is elected before the term of pro-Syrian Emile Lahoud expires on November 23, Lebanon may end up with two rival governments and bloodshed.
"It is expected that the session will not be held on Tuesday, October 23, in order to continue negotiations on a compromise candidate," the official said yesterday.
Opposition MPs boycotted parliament on Sep-tember 25 to prevent a two-thirds quorum and thwart anti-Syrian factions, which have a razor-thin majority, from electing a new head of state.
Prime Minister Fouad Siniora's backers, including the United States and Saudi Arabia, want to replace Lahoud with one of their own.
Syrian troops first intervened in Lebanon to end its civil war and Damascus dominated Lebanese politics until the assassination of former prime minister Rafik Hariri in February 2005.
Damascus was forced by political upheavals after the Hariri assassination to withdraw its forces after a 29-year military presence.
Message of unity
Seven other anti-Syrian figures have been killed since the Hariri assassination, including most recently MP Antoine Ganem. Leading Lebanese anti-Syrian figures blame Damascus for the killings, a charge Damascus denies.
Hezbollah and its allies in the opposition want to deny the presidency to their rivals, whom they regard as puppets of the United States.
The foreign ministers of France, Spain and Italy met with Lebanese leaders yesterday to press for a resolution to the crisis over choosing a president.
After meeting Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, leader of the opposition Amal group, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said they brought a "message of unity and sover-eignty of Lebanon and a message of the necessity of completing the Lebanese presidential election".
The three ministers met Siniora and were to meet the influential Maronite Patriarch Nasrallah Sfeir.
Earlier the ministers met their respective UN peacekeeping contingents who are part of a Unifil force which was expanded last year as part of a UN Security Council resolution which halted a war between Hez-bollah and Israel.
Unifil has been the target of attacks, the most significant of which killed 6 UN peacekeepers from the Spanish battalion in June.
On Friday, Sa'ad Al Hariri and Berri met for the first time since before the Eid holidays and discussed names of potential candidates.
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