SHOTLIST:

Beirut - 30 June 2011

++16:9++

1. Wide exterior of Justice Palace

2. Mid of Justice Palace sign

3. Mid of media outside the Justice Palace

4. Set up of Future Movement bloc Member of Parliament, Atef Majdalani

5. Photograph of Majdalani with Saad Hariri, son of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri

6. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Atef Majdalani, Future Movement bloc MP:

"We consider the release of the indictment today is part of our martyr's rights, and this indictment is the first step to achieve the truth then justice in order to stabilise Lebanon."

FILE: Beirut - 14 February 2005

++4:3++

7. Various of explosion site where Rafik Hariri was killed

FILE: Beirut - 2004

++4:3++

8. Various of Rafik Hariri giving a speech

STORYLINE:

A U.N.-backed court investigating the 2005 assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri delivered an indictment and four arrest warrants Thursday, the latest turn in a case that has transformed this Arab nation and brought down the government earlier this year.

The names of the accused were not released, but the court has been expected to accuse members of the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah.

Many fear that could lead to street protests and plunge the violence-wracked

country back into a new crisis.

The long-awaited indictment was confirmed by the office of Hariri's son, Saad.

According to tribunal rules, Lebanese authorities now have 30 days to serve the indictments on suspects or execute arrest warrants. If they fail, the court can then order the indictment published and advertised in local media.

Saad Hariri also served as Lebanon's prime minister. But he was forced from office in January, when Hezbollah and its allies toppled his government in a conflict over the tribunal.

The group, which is also backed by Syria, fiercely denies any role in the killing and says the tribunal is a conspiracy by Israel and the United

States.

The dispute over the investigation encapsulates Lebanon's most explosive conflicts: the role of Hezbollah, the country's most powerful political and military force; the country's dark history of sectarian divisions and violence; and Lebanon's fraught relationship with neighbouring Syria.

Rafik Hariri was killed along with 22 other people in a massive truck bombing along Beirut's waterfront on February 14, 2005.

The indictment raises concerns of a possible resurgence of violence that has blighted this tiny Arab country of four million people for years, including a devastating 1975-1990 civil war and sectarian battles between Sunnis and Shiites in 2008.

SHOTLIST:

1. Wide of skyline

2. Traffic on street

3. Wide of newspaper stand

4. Newspaper headline reading in English: "UN signs deal on Hariri court, raising pressure for ratification"

5. Tilt down on newspapers

6. People reading newspapers

7. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Farouk Fehmi, Vox pop:

"I support the international tribunal if it reveals those who killed Prime Minister (Rafik) Hariri, but if it is going to be politically biased I am against it."

8. Policeman directing traffic

9. Set up shot of Lebanese Telecommunications Minister Marwan Hamadeh

10. SOUNDBITE (English) Marwan Hamadeh, Minister of Telecommunications:

"I think it is a very important victory for Lebanon, for its legitimate government and especially for international justice and I think it paves the way for the ratification of the convention and the establishment of the international tribunal."

11. Cutaway of hands

12. SOUNDBITE (English) Marwan Hamadeh, Minister of Telecommunications:

"If, by force or by any other means, the opposition prevents it we will go back to the UN (United Nations) Security Council to have it adopted under Chapter Seven."

13. Wide pan of protesters' tents in downtown Beirut

14. Various exteriors of Lebanese prime minister's office, surrounded by barbed wire

STORYLINE:

Some Lebanese residents on Wednesday welcomed the signing of an agreement by the United Nations to set up an international tribunal to prosecute the suspected killers of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

Last week, Saniora sent a signed copy of the agreement for creating the court to the United Nations. U.N. Undersecretary-General for Legal Affairs Nicolas Michel signed the agreement in New York on Tuesday and returned it to Lebanon for ratification.

"UN signs deal on Hariri court, raising pressure for ratification," hailed the headline in the Lebanese newspaper "The Daily Star".

The tribunal aims to try suspects in the February 14, 2005, assassination of Hariri, who was killed along with 22 other people in a massive truck bomb in downtown Beirut.

Many in Lebanon suspect Syria was behind the killings. Syria has denied involvement.

The tribunal has become a major point of contention in Lebanon's power struggle between the anti-Syrian government of Prime Minister Fuad Saniora, which supports the creation of the UN-backed court, and pro-Syrian factions, including the Shiite Hezbollah movement.

One resident, Farouk Fehmi, was apprehensive about giving the tribunal his full support.

"I support the international tribunal if it reveals those who killed Prime Minister Hariri, but if it is going to be politically biased I am against it," he said.

Lebanese Minister of Telecommunications Marwan Hamadeh said that the agreement was "a very important victory for Lebanon, for its legitimate government and specially for international justice".

"If, by force or by any means, the opposition prevents it (the formation of the international tribunal) we will go back to the UN Security Council to have it adopted under Chapter Seven," Hamadeh added.

Under Chapter Seven the UN Security Council has broader power to decide what measures are to be taken in situations involving "threats to the peace, breaches of the peace, or acts of aggression".

In such situations, the Council is not limited to recommendations but may take action, including the use of armed force "to maintain or restore international peace and security".

In November, Hezbollah and its allies quit the Cabinet as it was moving to approve the tribunal after Saniora rejected their demand for a new national unity government which would give their camp veto power over major government decisions.

The Hezbollah-led opposition has staged a campaign of protests for the past two months aiming to bring down Saniora's government and replace it with one in which they would hold one-third plus one of the seats, allowing them to veto major decisions.

Hezbollah, which is worried the tribunal will be politicised and used against it, says the government should not consider the tribunal until such a government is formed.

The protests turned violent in January when eight people were killed in clashes between opposition and government supporters, raising fears that the political crisis could once again push Lebanon into civil war.

The fate of the tribunal now rests with the Lebanese, with ratification requiring a vote in Parliament.

Ratification requires a vote from Parliament, but Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri - a Hezbollah ally - has refused to convene the legislature, where it would be brought to a vote.

SHOTLIST:

1. Wide of funeral

2. Wife of Walid Eido, assassinated legislator, waving from balcony

3. Women crying and waving

4. Ambulance covered by Lebanese flag and poster of Eido

5. Youths chanting slogans whilst travelling with ambulance

6. Wide of funeral

7. Mid of Saad Hariri, son of Rafik Hariri, the assassinated former Lebanese prime minister, walking along in procession

8. Wide of funeral procession

9. SOUNDBITE: (English) Walid Jumblatt, Druse politician:

"Syrian regime with their allies are trying to reduce our majority in the parliament. They have killed yesterday a prominent member of parliament. They can kill three more, if they kill three more members we will lose the majority and this is their calculation so that the government of Saniora will fall down."

10. Mid of Hezbollah MP bloc's flag

11. SOUNDBITE: (Arabic) Hussein Hajj Hassan, Hezbollah MP:

"We condemn the terror act which led to the killing of legislator Walid Eido, his son, two of his bodyguards and several Lebanese citizens. And we think that these crimes are taking place and are synchronised by the political exposure in the country. We think that the politicians are invited to find a political solution to the crisis in order to deal with all the disputed issues, as well as dealing with the security exposure. Some intelligence parties are getting benefits and committing these acts of terror and committing seditious acts against the Lebanese."

12. Tilt down of Al-Khachekji Mosque, mourners, security

13. Wide of funeral procession, coffin being carried

14. Various mid shots of coffins being carried to mosque

15. Top shot of three coffins inside the mosque (containing bodies of Walid Eido, his son, and one of the bodyguards killed)

16. Relatives kissing a coffin

17. Saad Hariri, leader of the anti-Syrian majority bloc, in parliament arriving at the mosque

18. Worshippers praying at funeral

19. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Saad Hariri, leader of the anti-Syrian majority bloc in parliament:

"No one should think that this people will kneel and be frightened. I tell the criminals: you will be punished and you will be dragged to prisons and will face justice, God willing."

20. Body being lowered into grave

21. Eido's son crying

22. Another body being lowered into grave

23. Wide pan of cemetery

STORYLINE:

Tens of thousands of mourners bade farewell on Thursday to victims of a powerful car bombing in Beirut that killed a prominent anti-Syrian legislator and nine others as the Lebanese government - reeling from another blow targeting its supporters - sought international help.

A bomb ripped through Walid Eido's car on Wednesday as he drove from a seaside sports club, also killing his 35-year-old son, two bodyguards and six passers-by.

Thursday's funeral procession swelled to tens of thousands of mourners who escorted coffins carrying the bodies of Eido, his son and one of the bodyguards killed.

The mourners followed ambulances covered with Lebanese flags that drove from the American University Hospital in West Beirut to a mosque at the Shohada Cemetery several kilometres (miles) away for a prayer service and internment.

It drove down the main thoroughfare of Corniche Mazraa in the Muslim sector of the capital, where pictures of the assassinated politicians were posted on walls and overpasses and Eido's widow waved to the crowds from a balcony.

Saad Hariri, leader of the anti-Syrian majority bloc in parliament to which Eido belonged, Druse politician Walid Jumblatt and other prominent anti-Syrian leaders also marched in the procession.

Jumblatt, an anti-Syrian MP, said that if the Syrian regime killed three more MPs, "we will lose the majority and this is their calculation so that the government of Saniora will fall down."

One Hezbollah MP, whose party is pro-Syrian, also condemned the killings.

"Some intelligence parties are getting benefits and committing these acts of terror and acting seditiously against the Lebanese," Hussein Hajj Hassan said.

At the Al-Khachekji mosque, male relatives sobbed and bent to kiss the coffins laid next to one another.

The spiritual leader of Lebanon's Sunni Muslims, Grand Mufti of the Republic Sheik Mohammed Rashid Kabbani, led the prayers, with Saad Hariri, son of assassinated former prime minister Rafik Hariri, at his side.

Saad Hariri said Lebanon would not kneel before the killers and promised they would be brought to justice.

"No one should think that this people will kneel and be frightened," he said. "I tell the criminals, you will be punished and you will be dragged to prisons and will face justice, God willing."

Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora has called for an emergency meeting of Arab foreign ministers and the international community to assist in the investigation of Eido's assassination.

The blast that killed Eido was a new blow to the stability of an already conflict-torn nation.

It came just three days after the government, together with the United Nations, started putting together an international tribunal ordered by the UN Security Council to try suspects in the killing of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri in Beirut two years ago - a move strongly opposed by Syria and its allies in Lebanon.

Eido was a prominent supporter of the tribunal, a staunch follower of Hariri and the seventh anti-Syrian figure killed in Lebanon in the past two years.

Many in Lebanon have accused Syria of being behind the killings, a claim Damascus denies.

Lebanon's majority coalition blamed Syria for Wednesday's assassination.

Syria controlled Lebanon for 29 years until it was forced out after Hariri's assassination, and its Lebanese opponents believe it is seeking to regain domination by plunging the country into chaos.

Businesses, schools and government offices were closed on Thursday after the government declared a day of national mourning.

The killings were likely to further enflame Lebanon's bitter power struggle between Saniora's Western-backed government and its Syrian-backed opponents, led by the Hezbollah militant group.

As the fighting in the north, pitting the Lebanese Army against Palestinian militants, with Palestinian refugees under siege, continues, many fear the violence there and in Beirut could push the polarised nation, with a fragile balance of ethnic and religious groups, into a new civil war.

SHOTLIST

1. Wide of meeting between Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Saniora (right) and parliament majority leader Saad Hariri

2. Hariri sat in blue suit

3. Hariri with Saniora

4. Wide of news conference

5. SOUNDBITE: (Arabic) Saad Hariri, parliament majority leader:

"Today what happened was an attempt to kill our soldiers and policemen. This is a blow to Lebanese security. The International Tribunal is coming. Nobody will stop it. There is a conspiracy that they are making right and left."

6. Press cutaway

7. SOUNDBITE: (Arabic) Saad Hariri, parliament majority leader:

"I don't think that there is any support for Fatah Al-Islam from any Lebanese political party and whoever supports them, let him announce it."

8. Hariri leaving news conference

STORYLINE:

Saad Hariri, head of Lebanon's largest Sunni political faction and leader of the country's parliamentary majority, urged supporters on Sunday to cooperate with authorities after renewed violence in northern Lebanon on Sunday.

The fighting between security forces and Fatah Islam militants left more than 30 people dead and threatens to further destabilise the country.

Lebanon is facing its worst political fall out between the Western-backed government and pro-Syrian opposition since the end of the 1975-90 civil war.

Street battles were fought in Tripoli on Sunday, a predominantly Sunni Muslim city, while guns pounded shells on a Fatah Islam stronghold located in a Palestinian refugee camp nearby.

Hariri, who met for talks with Prime Minister Fouad Saniora in Beirut, told reporters afterwards that the violence may have been linked to efforts to set up an international tribunal that would try the killers of his father, former Premier Rafik Hariri.

Hariri was assassinated in February 2005.

"This is a blow to Lebanese security. The International Tribunal is coming. Nobody will stop it," Hariri said.

SHOTLIST

1. Wide of area were bomb blast happened

2. Mid of men looking at the remains of a car

3. Cordon next to remains of a vehicle

4. People inspecting damage

5. Dented parked cars along the road

6. Mangled vehicles

7. Pan of damage

8.Damaged building

9. People looking at damage

10. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Elie Roukoz, Beirut Resident:

" As you see the whole buildings are damaged, we felt that the ground is shaking up and down."

11. Cars along street in Beirut

12. Various of man reading paper

13. Pan of papers on the news stand

14. Mid of front page reading (ENGLISH) " MP Antoine Ghamen assassinated"

15. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Samer Mrad, Beirut Resident

" We want to see and to know the hands behind such acts and who has the interest. This is only affecting the poor and miserable people."

16. Lebanese security forces convoy along street

17. SOUNDBITE: (Arabic) Saad Hariri, Lebanese lawmaker heading the main anti-Syrian alliance in Parliament:

"The presidency does not belong to Saad Hariri, or to Hassan Nasrallah, or to Nabih Berri, or to Michel Aoun, or to any other party. The presidency belongs to the people of Lebanon."

18. Cutaway

19. SOUNDBITE: (Arabic) Saad Hariri, Lebanese lawmaker heading the main anti-Syrian alliance in Parliament:

"The International Tribunal, which will try those cowardly criminal killers, will also try those who sabotage the presidential elections."

20. Various of locked up shops

STORYLINE

Lebanese leaders pledged on Thursday to press ahead with a divisive election for president, to be held in Parliament in coming days, despite the car bombing assassination of an anti-Syrian lawmaker.

Wednesday's bomb killed Antoine Ghanem, an anti-Syria lawmaker, and six others in a Christian neighbourhood of Beirut and threatened to derail efforts to bring the country's rival parties together to agree on a head of state ahead of time, before voting is set to begin next week.

Investigators were at the sight examining the remains of the blast.

At least 67 were wounded in the explosion, which severely damaged buildings and set cars ablaze during rush hour on a busy street in the Sin el-Fil neighbourhood.

Ghanem, 64, a member of the right-wing Christian Phalange party, had returned from refuge abroad only two days earlier. He was the eighth anti-Syria figure and fourth governing coalition lawmaker to be assassinated in less than three years.

On Thursday Lebanese newspapers were focused entirely on the assassination.

Samer Mrad a Beirut resident said he wants to know who is behind the attack.

" We want to see and to know that hands behind such acts and who has the interest. This is only affecting the poor and miserable people," he said.

Coalition members blamed Syria for the death, but Damascus denied involvement, as it has for the previous seven assassinations, including the 2005 bombing death of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

Prime Minister Fuad Saniora asked the United Nations secretary-general in a letter to add the Ghanem assassination to an international probe into Hariri's slaying and other political crimes in Lebanon.

On Wednesday Hariri's son, who now heads the main anti-Syrian alliance in the Lebanese parliament, called the perpetrators of the attack "cowardly criminal killers".

"The presidency does not belong to Saad Hariri, or to Hassan Nasrallah, or to Nabih Berri, or to Michel Aoun, or to any other party. The presidency belongs to the people of Lebanon," Saad Hariri said.

Many people fear the divisions over the presidency could lead to creation of two rival governments, a grim threat to repeat the last two years of Lebanon's 1975-90 civil war when army units loyal to competing administrations battled it out.

President Emile Lahoud, an ally of Syria, is due to step down from the presidency by November 23 and government supporters see the vote as the opportunity to put one of their own in the post.

But Hezbollah and its allies have vowed to block any candidate they do not approve and they can do so by boycotting the ballots, preventing the needed two-thirds quorum of 85 votes.

If no candidate is agreed on by the time Lahoud steps down, Prime Minister Fuad Saniora and his cabinet would automatically take on executive powers.

If that happens, opposition supporters have said Lahoud might appoint a second government, a step many fear would break up the country.

Schools, universities and many businesses in Christian areas of Beirut, plus in the Mount Lebanon region north of the capital, closed on Thursday in a day of mourning and to observe a strike called by the Phalange Party.

A funeral was to be held Friday.

SHOTLIST

1. Tilt-up of rubble to people setting up security cordon

2. Pan from wreckage of one car to wreckage of another car

3. Soldiers shouting orders

4. Paramedic running to help, pan to vehicle being hosed

5. SOUNDBITE: (Arabic) Saad Hariri, Lebanese lawmaker heading the main anti-Syrian alliance in Parliament:

"The presidency does not belong to Saad Hariri, or to Hassan Nasrallah, or to Nabih Berri, or to Michel Aoun, or to any other party. The presidency belongs to the people of Lebanon."

6. Cutaway

7. SOUNDBITE: (Arabic) Saad Hariri, Lebanese lawmaker heading the main anti-Syrian alliance in Parliament:

"The International Tribunal, which will try those cowardly criminal killers, will also try those who sabotage the presidential elections."

8. Wide view from above blast site

STORYLINE

A powerful bomb killed an anti-Syria lawmaker and six others in a Christian neighbourhood of Beirut on Wednesday, threatening to derail an effort by an already deeply divided parliament to elect Lebanon's next president in voting to begin next week.

Antoine Ghanem, a 64-year-old member of the Christian Phalange party who had returned from refuge abroad only two days earlier, was the eighth

anti-Syria figure and fourth lawmaker from the governing coalition to be assassinated in less than three years.

Coalition members blamed Syria, but Damascus denied involvement, as it has for the previous seven assassinations, including the 2005 bombing of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, a killing that ignited huge protests that forced Syria to withdraw its troops after a three-decade occupation.

Hariri's son, who now heads the main anti-Syrian alliance in the Lebanese parliament, called the perpetrators of Wednesday's attack "cowardly criminal killers".

"The presidency does not belong to Saad Hariri, or to Hassan Nasrallah, or to Nabih Berri, or to Michel Aoun, or to any other party. The presidency belongs to the people of Lebanon," Saad Hariri said.

Many people fear the divisions over the presidency could lead to creation of two rival governments, a grim threat to repeat the last two years of

Lebanon's 1975-90 civil war when army units loyal to competing administrations battled it out.

President Emile Lahoud, an ally of Syria, is due to step down from the presidency by November 23 and government supporters see the vote as the opportunity to put one of their own in the post.

But Hezbollah and its allies have vowed to block any candidate they do not approve and they can do so by boycotting the ballots, preventing the needed two-thirds quorum of 85 votes.

If no candidate is agreed on by the time Lahoud steps down, Prime Minister Fuad Saniora and his cabinet would automatically take on executive powers.

If that happens, opposition supporters have said Lahoud might appoint a second government, a step many fear would break up the country.

Lebanese citizens on Tueday reacted to the verdicts of the trial in absentia of four members of the Hezbollah militant group accused of involvement in the truck bomb assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri in 2005.

The presiding judge at the U.N.-backed tribunal in the Netherlands said the evidence against them was "almost entirely circumstantial."

The verdicts were delayed by nearly two weeks as a mark of respect for victims of the explosion in Beirut's port which killed around 180 people, injured more than 6,000, left a quarter of a million with homes unfit to live in.

Presiding Judge David Re said the written judgment in the long-running trial amounted to more than 2,600 pages with some 13,000 footnotes.

Sketching the complex political backdrop for the assassination, Re said Hariri was a supporter or reducing the influence of Syria and Hezbollah in Syria in the months before his death.

Judges were "of the view that Syria and Hezbollah may have had motives to eliminate Mr. Hariri, and some of his political allies," Re said, but he added that "there was no evidence" that the Hezbollah leadership or Syria was involved in the truck bombing.

One supporter of the late Prime Minister said he had been waiting for the result of the trial "for 15 years" and that "God willing today the truth will be made public."

Beirut - August, 18, 2020

1. Various posters of Lebanon's late Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, on Beirut roads

2. Various of people watching TV in a coffee shop

3. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Abo Azizi, Hariri supporter:

"Rafik Hariri was killed and may he rest in peace. It is not important to take your right on the ground, but it is important that you know who killed Rafik Hariri so that people know how a peaceful man whose hands were not tainted with blood was killed."

4. Hariri posters in Tareeq Al-Jadideh neighborhood

5. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Abed Itani:

"We have been waiting for the truth for 15 years and God willing, today the truth will be made public. All what we want from the world and the Lebanese state is that those who carried out this explosion be punished in accordance with justice."

6. Various of Lebanon's late Prime Minister Rafik Hariri statue

SHOTLIST

Tripoli

1. Tanks and soldiers in the streets of residential area

2. Soldiers firing from armoured vehicles at building occupied by militants

3. Various of soldiers in gun battle

4. Wounded soldier being lifted onto stretcher

5. Ambulance driving past

6. Zoom in on journalist wounded with leg injury and medic dressing the wound

++AUDIO IS MUTE++

7. Wounded Lebanese soldier being carried away

Tripoli

8. Armed Islamic militants firing from roof of building

9. Militants on roof of building

10. Lebanese army troops running across street and firing at building

11. Soldier firing at building

Tripoli

12. Front of building damaged by fire and bullet holes

13. Bodies of dead militants on ground +++GRAPHIC+++

14. Fire still smouldering in building used by militants

15. Tilt down of badly damaged building

16. Militants' weapons on ground

17. Various of dead militants +++GRAPHIC+++

18. Burnt out cars

Nahr el-Bared Palestinian refugee camp

19. Paramedics gathered round back of ambulance, wounded soldier on stretcher

Nahr el-Bared Palestinian refugee camp

20. Convoy of tanks travelling on Tripoli to Beirut highway

21. Lebanese soldiers at highway roadblock

22. Tank firing missile on target inside refugee camp

Nahr el-Bared Palestinian refugee camp

23. Lebanese soldiers spreading out along concrete barrier on road leading to camp

24. Wide shot road leading to camp, military vehicles, AUDIO: gunfire

25. Zoom into smoke rising from camp, pull out to wide

26. Tank on the move, group of soldiers

27. Closer shot group of soldiers, including one carrying hand held rocket launcher

Beirut

28. Wide of news conference

29. SOUNDBITE: (Arabic) Saad Hariri, parliament majority leader:

"Today what happened was an attempt to kill our soldiers and policemen. This is a blow to Lebanese security. The International Tribunal is coming. Nobody will stop it. There is a conspiracy that they are making right and left."

30. Reporters

31. SOUNDBITE: (Arabic) Saad Hariri, parliament majority leader:

"I don't think that there is any support for Fatah Al-Islam from any Lebanese political party and whoever supports them, let him announce it."

32. Hariri leaving news conference

++NIGHT SHOTS ++

Nahr el-Bared Palestinian refugee camp

33. Convoy of military vehicles driving along road

34. Armoured cars driving past

STORYLINE:

A fierce gunbattle in Lebanon fought on the streets of the predominantly Sunni city of Tripoli and in a Palestinian refugee camp close by left at least 22 soldiers and 17 Islamic militants dead on Sunday.

Dozens more were wounded.

It was the worst violence Lebanon's second largest city had witnessed in two decades.

The clashes between troops surrounding the Nahr el-Bared camp and fighters from the militant Fatah Islam began early in the morning shortly after police raided a militant-occupied apartment and a gunbattle erupted, witnesses said.

Ten militants were killed in the building in Tripoli and seven in the refugee camp, security officials said.

Abu Salim, a spokesman for Fatah Islam, only confirmed two militants died and five were wounded inside the camp as a result of the shelling.

Several bodies could be seen lying among the debris of rubble, broken glass and burned out cars as Lebanese forces overpowered the occupants.

A senior security official later said a high-ranking member of Fatah Islam, known as Abu Yazan, was among those killed.

The group is considered by some Lebanese officials to be a radical Sunni Muslim group with ties to al-Qaida, or at least al-Qaida style militancy and doctrine.

Some anti-Syrian government officials claim the group is a front for Syrian military intelligence aimed at destabilising Lebanon although both Syria and the group deny any links to each other.

Several observers on Sunday were openly hostile, with many heard to applaud as the army began pounding shells at the Nahr el-Bared Palestinian refugee camp where the militant group has headquarters.

The camp is also home to tens of thousands of Palestinians who took refuge there to escape the fighting in Israel.

Residents in the camp reported at least 12 civilians killed or wounded.

The figure could not be confirmed: Lebanese authorities have no presence there.

The fighting threatens to further destabilise a conflict-ridden Lebanon that is facing its worst political fall out between the Western-backed government and pro-Syrian opposition since the end of the 1975-90 civil war.

Tripoli has not seen violence on this scale since 1986, when Syrian troops, who were then in control, fought a rebellion in the city.

Prime Minister Fuad Saniora said the fighting was a dangerous attempt at hitting Lebanese security and called on the Lebanese to rally behind the government.

Saad Hariri, head of Lebanon's largest Sunni political faction and leader of the country's parliamentary majority, urged supporters to cooperate with authorities.

Hariri, who met for talks with Prime Minister Fouad Saniora in Beirut, told reporters afterwards that the violence may have been linked to efforts to set up an international tribunal that would try the killers of his father, former Premier Rafik Hariri.

Hariri was assassinated in February 2005.

"This is a blow to Lebanese security. The International Tribunal is coming. Nobody will stop it," Hariri said.

Military presence remained strong in and around Tripoli after nightfall on Sunday.

SHOTLIST

Beirut - 28 February 2009

1. Wide pan of Beirut cityscape

2. Ein El Mraiseh street, site of explosion that killed former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri

3. Mid of Rafik Hariri statue

4. Mid of damage to building

5. Memorial flame where Hariri was assassinated

6. Set up of Member of Parliament Aatef Majdalani in his office

7. Close of photograph featuring Majdalani and Hariri

8. SOUNDBITE (Arabic): Aatef Majdalani, Lebanese legislator from the Future Movement bloc:

" The start of the international tribunal is the beginning of the saving of Lebanon and the start of the international tribunal is the beginning of the end of the political assassination."

9. Cutaway Hariri pin on Majdalani's lapel

10. SOUNDBITE (Arabic): Aatef Majdalani, Lebanese legislator from the Future Movement bloc:

" When the slain Prime Minister President Rafik Hariri was assassinated, the Syrian regime was in Lebanon and Lebanon was under the Syrian hegemony. The entire security was under their hands and that is why the international investigation committee pointed its accusation against the regime. I think that the tribunal should be able to try any suspect or criminal."

11. Tilt down exterior of Al-Amin mosque in central Beirut

12. Sign indicating "1475" days since Hariri's assassination

13. Various of Hariri's grave

14. Wide of Lebanese justice minister, Ibrahim Najjar, in his office

15. Cutaway close-up of Lebanese flag

16. SOUNDBITE (English): Ibrahim Najjar, Lebanese Justice Minister:

" The tribunal will be really independent and I think that, at least as far as Lebanese politicians are concerned, we have no intention whatsoever to interfere with the tribunal and its independence. This is really the way we see the tribunal functioning - with independence and capacity and only in order to find out the truth and to give their verdict."

17. Cutaway camera lens

18. SOUNDBITE (English): Ibrahim Najjar, Lebanese Justice Minister:

" Lebanon has really shocked with too many assassinations. I would say since more than 30 even 40 years. And it is about time now to terminate all that processes. We have to know who did what and this will be very benefit for us."

FILE: Beirut - 14 March 2005

19. Pan across protest crowd, protesters holding Lebanese flags

20. Mid of posters featuring Lebanese security chiefs being held up

Beirut - 28 February 2009

21. Set up of Samar Al-Hajj, wife of detained Brigadier General Ali Hajj

22. Portrait of Brigadier General Ali Hajj

23. SOUNDBITE (Arabic): Samar Al-Hajj, Wife of detained Brigadier General Ali Hajj:

" We have been detained illegally for three and a half years. There is no existence for any law that can justify the detention of freedom. The detention is justified by a non-existent authority, in an illegal prison which does not exist on the prisons' map in Lebanon and does not relate to the chief of police as other prisons. If we want to speak legally we should not go to The Hague, otherwise they can take them (the four pro-Syria generals) in an arbitrary way, exceeding all the protocols and keep them there until the end of the parliamentarian elections."

FILE: Beirut - 15 February 2005

24. Various of aftermath of explosion which killed Hariri, firefighters tackling blazing vehicle wreckage

STORYLINE

Investigators have pored over evidence for four years - a human tooth found at the bombing site, a suicide truck that was stolen in Japan and made its way to Lebanon, reams of phone records and hundreds of interviews.

Now the focus in one of the Mideast's most dramatic political assassinations is shifting to prosecution, with the convening on Sunday of an international tribunal on the slaying of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

Despite the start of proceedings in the Netherlands, it is still not known who will be accused in the suicide truck bombing that killed Hariri and 22 other people on a seaside street in Beirut on February 14, 2005.

Also unknown is the most politically explosive question - whether the proceedings will implicate Syria's government, which many Lebanese believe was behind the murder of a man who led opposition to the long Syrian military occupation of Lebanon.

Syria has denied any involvement.

The tribunal was welcomed on Saturday by Lebanese lawmaker Aatef Majdalani, of the Future Movement bloc, who said it would be the saving of Lebanon.

Majdalani said that Syria would be in the spotlight as Lebanon was under the Syrian regime at the time of the assassination.

The United Nations Security Council had to impose the mixed Lebanese-international Special Tribunal after Lebanon's parliament was too divided to approve it.

But Lebanese Justice Minister Ibrahim Najjar insisted that the tribunal would be truly independent.

Most likely the first defendants before the court will be four pro-Syria generals who led Lebanon's police, intelligence service and an elite army unit at the time of the assassination.

They are the only people in custody, though they have not been formally charged.

The wife of one of the four officers detained, Brigadier General Ali Hajj, on Saturday called their detention "illegal".

Some in Lebanon doubt the court will ever bring out the full truth, believing it might avoid digging deep to ensure Syria does not react by stirring up trouble in Lebanon and other parts of the region.

Trials could also further polarise Lebanon's politics, feeding the power struggle between pro- and anti-Syria factions.

Administrators have said the tribunal will take up to five years to finish its work, and the top UN prosecutor, Daniel Bellemare of Canada, said in a statement on Saturday that it will be thorough.

As prime minister, Hariri, a billionaire businessman, was credited with rebuilding downtown Beirut after the 1975-90 civil war, and with trying to limit Syria's influence.

In a country known for political assassinations, his killing stands out for its far-reaching impact and set off huge anti-Syrian street protests in Lebanon and intense international pressure which forced Damascus to withdraw all its troops from Lebanon a few months later, ending nearly three decades of military domination.

But his death also threw Lebanon into turmoil.

Anti-Syria factions supported by the West won control of the government but were unable to exert any authority while locked in a struggle with Syria's allies, led by the Hezbollah movement.

The first UN investigator into the killing, Detlev Mehlis of Germany, said the assassination plot's complexity suggested a role by the Syrian intelligence services and its pro-Syria Lebanese counterpart.

But the two chief investigators who followed Mehlis have worked quietly and have not named any individuals or countries as suspects.

Last April (2008), Bellemare said investigators had evidence Hariri's killing was done by a "criminal network" also linked to a series of bombings and shootings that have killed seven anti-Syria figures and caused other deaths since Hariri's assassination.

The UN team worked under tight security for fear of attacks or intimidation, living in fortified compounds in Beirut and travelling in heavily protected motorcades.

The team also kept tight control of information about the investigation.

One piece of evidence is the tooth of the suicide bomber.

Forensic examinations determined the truck's driver was a man in his 20s who was not from Lebanon, according to Bellemare's predecessor as top investigator, Serge Brammertz of Belgium.

Investigators interviewed hundreds of people, including the presidents of Lebanon and Syria.

They acquired records listing more than 5 billion telephone calls and mobile phone text messages.

They determined the truck used in the bombing was stolen in Kanagawa, Japan, in October 2004 and purchased two months later near the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli.

The probe has also seen numerous twists.

Husam Husam, a Syrian barber and self-proclaimed intelligence operative, at first implicated Syrian officials in testimony to investigators.

Then he left Lebanon for Syria and appeared on TV, recanting and saying the Hariri family paid him to frame Syria.

Lebanon's government dismissed the claim.

Another purported Syrian intelligence officer, Mohammed Zuhair Siddiq, was at first said to be a key witness, then a suspect - then he vanished while under house arrest in France.

A Lebanese man who was questioned about the sale of cell phone chips allegedly used for communicating in the bombing was found dead in what was ruled a car accident.

Syria's interior minister, Brigadier General Ghazi Kenaan, died in his Damascus office in late 2005 about a month after speaking with investigators.

Syrian officials said he shot himself to death, but some in Lebanon believe he was killed.

Kenaan ran Lebanon for two decades until 2003.

SHOTLIST:

1. Wide of Saad Hariri, Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister entering news conference UPSOUND: Applause

2. Cutaway of media

3. SOUNDBITE: (Arabic) Saad Hariri, Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister:

++CAMERA PULLS OUT AND ZOOMS IN DURING BITE++

"We will go to the consultations and we will give our opinion while committed to my nomination for the prime minister's post, which is supported by the Future movement bloc and other allies."

4. Photographer

5. SOUNDBITE: (Arabic) Saad Hariri, Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister:

"Sedition will not be the required price for truth and justice."

6. Hariri at end of news conference, audience applauding

7. Various of Lebanese army convoy patrolling streets ++NIGHT SHOT++

8. Wide of office of Prime Minister++NIGHT SHOT++

STORYLINE:

Lebanon's caretaker prime minister said on Thursday that he will seek the post again, one week after the militant group Hezbollah toppled his government and sparked fears that the country's political crisis could descend into street battles.

Saad Hariri's Western-backed government fell last week over a dispute linked to a United Nations tribunal investigating the assassination of his father, former prime minister Rafik Hariri.

Many fear that Hezbollah - widely expected to be indicted by the court - will react violently if accused.

In a televised address, Hariri said he would continue efforts to solve the crisis diplomatically.

"We will go to the consultations and we will give our opinion while committed to my nomination for the prime minister's post, which is supported by the Future movement bloc and other allies", the 40-year-old said, speaking in front of a poster of his father, who was killed in a massive truck bombing along Beirut's waterfront in 2005.

The most recent talks, involving Qatar and Turkey, failed to reach a compromise.

Lebanese special police forces meanwhile tightened security around the government palace and other official buildings on Thursday amid growing fears that the country was headed toward violence.

A senior security official confirmed that the security measures in and around Beirut stem from "concerns of movements on the ground by some parties."

The official spoke on condition of anonymity in line with regulations.

Special police forces were seen placing cement barriers around the government house in Beirut and putting up reinforcements around government buildings and banks.

Armoured personnel carriers were deployed to many areas of the city.

The new measures follow the departure from Beirut of Qatari and Turkish mediators after two days of talks that apparently failed to resolve the differences between Lebanon's main rival factions and bring them back together in a coalition government.

Hezbollah denies any role in Rafik Hariri's killing and forced the collapse of the government last week when Saad Hariri refused to renounce the tribunal and pull Lebanon's funding for the court.

The militant group says the tribunal is a conspiracy by Israel and the United States.

There are concerns that supporters of the group may take to the streets, setting the stage for sectarian fighting similar to Shiite-Sunni street clashes that killed 81 people in 2008.

Hariri was Lebanon's most prominent Sunni leader.

SHOTLIST:

1. Wide exterior of Prime Ministers' office

2. Close-up of Lebanese flag

3. Wide of Lebanese prime minister Najib Mikati before news conference

4. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Najib Mikati, Lebanese Prime Minister:

"After years of waiting, the International General Prosecutor issued an indictment and showed information that was gathered by the international investigations and accused members of being involved in the crime."

5. Cutaway Lebanese flag

6. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Najib Mikati, Lebanese Prime Minister:

"We are today in front of a new reality that requests a wise approach and putting the supreme interest of the country, civil peace, our national unity and knowing the truth above all concerns. So we will deal with responsibility and reality with this incident, starting from that the accusations whatever its sources are not verdicts and the accusations need real and undoubted proves and any accused person is innocent until its accusation is proved."

7. Wide of news conference

STORYLINE:

Lebanon's prime minister Najib Mikati said national unity, peace and truth should trump all other concerns, after a United Nations-backed court investigating the 2005 assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri delivered an indictment and four arrest warrants on Thursday.

The UN tribunal's decision marks the latest turn in a case that has transformed this Arab nation and brought down the government earlier this year.

At a news conference in Beirut, Mikati said it demanded "a wise approach and putting the supreme interest of the country, civil peace, our national unity and knowing the truth above all concerns."

The names of the accused were not released, but a Lebanese official said at least one member of the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah is among those indicted.

The official saw the arrest warrants that were issued on Thursday and gave the names to The Associated Press. He spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.

One of the people named is Mustafa Badr-Eddine, believed to have been Hezbollah's deputy military commander.

He is the brother-in-law of the late Hezbollah military commander Imad Mughniyeh.

Many fear the indictment of Hezbollah members could lead to street protests and plunge the violence-wracked country back into a new crisis.

The long-awaited indictment was confirmed by the office of Hariri's son, Saad.

According to tribunal rules, Lebanese authorities now have 30 days to serve the indictments on suspects or execute arrest warrants.

If they fail, the court can then order the indictment published and advertised in local media.

Saad Hariri also served as Lebanon's prime minister, but he was forced from office in January, when Hezbollah and its allies toppled his government in a conflict over the tribunal.

The group, which is also backed by Syria, fiercely denies any role in the killing and says the tribunal is a conspiracy by Israel and the United States.

The dispute over the investigation encapsulates Lebanon's most explosive conflicts: the role of Hezbollah, the country's most powerful political and military force; the country's dark history of sectarian divisions and violence; and Lebanon's fraught relationship with neighbouring Syria.

Rafik Hariri was killed along with 22 other people in a massive truck bombing along Beirut's waterfront on February 14, 2005.

The indictment raises concerns of a possible resurgence of violence that has blighted this tiny Arab country of four million people for years, including a devastating 1975-1990 civil war and sectarian battles between Sunnis and Shiites in 2008.

SHOTLIST:

1. Exterior of prime ministers office

2. Lebanese and German flags

3. Various of honour guard

4. German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora standing for honour guard

5. Merkel and Saniora inspecting honour guard

6. Mid of honour guard

7. Wide of bilateral meeting

8. Mid of Merkel

9. Mid of meeting

10. Merkel with Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri

11. Merkel and Berri inside meeting room

12. Close up of Berri

13. Close up of Merkel to pull of Merkel and German officials

14. Exterior of Qureitem palace

15. Saad Hariri, head of anti-Syrian parliamentary majority in Lebanon and son of slain former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri with US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi shaking hands

16. Cutaway cameramen

17. Various of meeting Pelosi and Hariri during the meeting

18. Close of Pelosi

19. Mid of Hariri with a poster for his father

20. Wide of US senators

21. SOUNDBITE (English), Nancy Pelosi, U.S. House Speaker:

"The purpose of the trip is part of our responsibility for the national security of the United States. We are here to see how we can make the world safer and to fight terrorism. Important to that is to establish the facts and be current on them."

22. Cutaway of cameraman

23. SOUNDBITE (English), Nancy Pelosi, U.S. House Speaker:

"We (will) go there (Syria) and will be talking about the overarching issue, the fight against terrorism and the role that Syria can play to help or to hinder that goal. So we will be talking also of course then about the tribunal, which is very important to establish the truth so we can go forward. That is one of the issues that we are going to bring up with them and of course the role of Syria in Iraq, the role of Syria supporting Hamas and Hezbollah, the role of Syria in so many respects that we think it could be a vast improvement."

24. Pelosi handling the Quran and leaving the palace

25. Exterior of Prime ministers' office building

26. Pelosi and Saniora greeted by the honour guards

27. Various of meeting with Pelosi and Saniora

STORYLINE:

German Chancellor Angela Merkel arrived in Beirut on Monday for talks with Lebanese leaders and to inspect a German naval task force serving with a U.N. peacekeeping force in Lebanon.

Merkel, whose country currently holds the rotating presidency of the European Union, was met by Prime Minister Fuad Saniora at Beirut airport.

She held talks with the Western-backed Saniora, and the Parliament Speaker and Amal leader Nabih Berri, who is a leading member of the Hezbollah-led opposition which is seeking to remove Saniora from office.

Merkel also planned to visit a German navy ship in Beirut's harbour during her one-day trip to Lebanon.

The Germans lead a naval task force of about 1,700 men and women who are patrolling the Lebanese coastline to prevent weapons from being smuggled to Hezbollah in accordance with a U.N. resolution that ended the summer war Lebanon and Israel.

The naval task force is attached to the U.N. Interim Force in Lebanon. (UNIFIL), numbering a total of about 13-thousand, and is deployed along the border with Israel.

Merkel has made the Middle East a top priority of her six-month EU presidency and is currently on a tour of the region. The Chancellor met Israeli and Palestinian leaders at the weekend.

The US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was also in Beirut for talks with Lebanese officials as part of a fact-finding trip to the Middle East that has drawn criticism from the White House because it includes a visit to Syria.

"We are here to see how we can make the world safer and to fight terrorism," she added.

Pelosi's visit to Lebanon comes amid sharp political divisions in the country between the government and the opposition.

The U.S.-backed Saniora faces an opposition campaign to unseat him, with protesters camped out in downtown Beirut demanding his resignation.

Pelosi also met with Saad Hariri, who has been pushing for international support for the creation of an international tribunal to try suspects in his father's February 2005 assassination, which he blames on Syria.

"We will be talking also of course then about the tribunal, which is very important to establish the truth so we can go forward," she said.

The Syrians have denied involvement, but their opponents in Lebanon say they are working hard to undermine the court through their allies in this country.

Pelosi's trip has drawn criticism from the White House because of a planned stop in Syria on Wednesday.

The US House Speaker said the trip to Syria was aimed at seeing what Damascus could do to help the fight against terrorism.

The White House called her Syria visit last week a "bad decision" because the administration considers the country a supporter of terrorism.

Her trip comes as the Democratic majority in Congress is locked in a battle with President George W. Bush over strategy in Iraq.

The trial of the Hezbollah members and supporters suspected of being behind the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister, Rafik Hariri, will finally start this week, nine years after his murder.

The suicide truck bomb attack that killed Hariri and 22 others on February 14, 2005 was one of the most dramatic top-level assassinations the Middle East and immediately caused an increase in what were already huge sectarian divisions between Sunni and Shiite Muslims.

The United Nations-backed Special Tribunal for Lebanon will begin on Thursday on the outskirts of The Hague in the Netherlands.

However, the five key suspects behind the attack will be tried in absentia as they are still yet to be arrested.

They included four Hezbollah members indicted in 2011 with plotting the attack and another supporter charged last year. All of them remain at large.

The trial will be held under a hybrid system of international and Lebanese law.

Hezbollah has condemned the trial as a conspiracy by its archenemies the US and Israel. It's also denied any involvement in Hariri's assassination.

Despite widespread criticism of the trial, some inside Lebanon are optimistic that justice will prevail.

"We are confident that the Special Tribunal for Lebanon will conduct these proceedings and the procedure in a very fair way in order to let the Lebanese at last find out the truth," said Ibrahim Najjar, a former Lebanese Justice Minister.

Other are hoping that the trial will help bring an end to the string of political assassinations which have rocked the country since Hariri's death.

The last attack was on December 27, 2013 when former finance minster Mohammed Chatah, a Hezbollah critic and also former aide to Hariri, was killed in a car bombing in Beirut.

"We and the international community wanted the tribunal to punish the criminals and to stop political assassinations," said legislator Atef Majdalani, a member of the Future Movement bloc that is headed by Hariri's son, Saad, also a former prime minister.

"Truth will emerge, justice is coming, therefore you should either move along this road, the road of justice, or justice will get you," Majdalani added.

But many question whether justice will indeed be done while the key defendants in the case are still at large.

AP TELEVISION

++16:9++

1. Wide of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri's grave with photos of him in the background and the statute of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon next to the grave

2. Close of the UN-ratified Statute reading (Arabic) "Statute of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon"

3. Mid of Hariri grave with photo on top

4. Wide of former Lebanese Justice Minister Ibrahim Najjar walking in his house

5. SOUNDBITE (English) Ibrahim Najjar, former Lebanese Justice Minister:

"We are confident that the Special Tribunal for Lebanon will conduct these proceedings and the procedure in a very fair way in order to let the Lebanese at last find out the truth."

6. Close of Najjar's hands holding a pair of glasses

7. SOUNDBITE (English) Ibrahim Najjar, former Lebanese Justice Minister:

"I think that for the first time since 1943, Lebanon is about now to discover the truth within an independent tribunal."

8. Close of photograph of Najjar

9. SOUNDBITE (English) Ibrahim Najjar, former Lebanese Justice Minister:

"Yes, there is a fear, at least somebody, some witnesses have declared that they fear to appear before the court and to say everything they have in mind or in their knowledge. I think that there is a real fear because when you kill a witness the truth is affected, that is why I think that there are special precautions, special undertakings that have been decided by the tribunal in order to protect them."

10. Mid of traffic at the explosion site where Hariri was killed

11. Close of Hariri statue

12. Atef Majdalani, Lebanese Member of Parliament walking

13. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Atef Majdalani, Future Movement MP:

"We and the international community wanted the tribunal to punish the criminals and to stop political assassinations, and to say that political assassinations will not solve any problems and that criminals responsible will be punished."

14. Close of photo of Majdalani and Hariri

15. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Dr Atef Majdalani, Future Movement MP:

"Truth will emerge, justice is coming, therefore you should either move along this road, the road of justice, or justice will get you and punish the criminals among you."

FILE: AP TELEVISION

14 February, 2005

++4:3++

16. Various of Hariri assassination blast site with burnt out cars and emergency services attempting to control flames

17. Wide top shot of people gathering at Martyrs' Square in Beirut

SHOTLIST

1. Wide exterior of Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri's residence

2. Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah and Hariri entering residence

3. King Abdullah shaking hands with Lebanese officials

4. Wide of meeting

5. Close of King Abdullah

6. Close of Hariri

7. Mid of Abdullah and Hariri meeting

8. King Abdullah waving from steps of plane as he departs

9. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, Hariri and Lebanese President Michel Suleiman (left to right) waving to Abdullah

10. Wide of King Abdullah entering plane

11. Assad saying goodbye to Hariri, Suleiman and Lebanese officials

12. Wide of Assad's plane taking off

13. Wide of Abdullah's plane taxiing

14. Wide of Qatari plane on tarmac

15. Qatari Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani descending from aircraft and Suleiman ++MUTE++

STORYLINE

The leaders of Syria and Saudi Arabia launched an unprecedented effort on Friday to defuse fears of violence over upcoming indictments in the 2005 assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri - the son of the slain statesman - met with Saudi King Abdullah at Hariri's residence in Beirut.

Earlier on Friday the two leaders, as well as Lebanese President Michel Suleiman met with Syrian President Bashar Assad.

It was a strong public show of cooperation between Saudi Arabia and Syria, which for years vied for influence over Lebanon.

Following the meetings, Abdullah and Assad departed for their respective homelands, and shortly afterwards Qatari Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani arrived for talks with the Lebanese leadership.

Many fear that new violence between Lebanon's Shiite and Sunni communities could break out if the international tribunal investigating Hariri's death implicates the Shiite militant group Hezbollah, which is Syria's main ally in Lebanon.

In May 2008, Hezbollah gunmen swept through Sunni pro-government neighbourhoods of Beirut, raising fears the country could fall into a new civil war.

That crisis was resolved only after fellow Arab countries mediated a truce and political compromise between the two sides that has tenuously held since.

Hariri was a Sunni leader with strong links to Saudi Arabia.

The international tribunal investigating Hariri's death has not announced who will be charged, but the leader of Hezbollah said last week members of his group will be among those indicted.

The summit was unusual on multiple levels, a sign of the depth of concern over the potential for violence.

Assad rarely goes to Beirut - his last trip was in 2002, which at the time was the first visit by a Syrian leader to the Lebanese capital in nearly three decades.

Many in Lebanon blame Syria for the truck bombing on Valentine's Day 2005 that killed Hariri, charges that Damascus denies.

The blast deepened a rift between Assad and Saudi King Abdullah, who each backed rival sides in the ensuing power struggle that nearly tore Lebanon apart since 2005: Syria backing a Hezbollah-led coalition and Saudi Arabia and the United States supporting a Sunni-led coalition.

In recent years, however, Assad and Abdullah have repaired ties, and the joint visit was a sign of how far the rift has healed.

No details were released about Friday's one-day summit, although Hezbollah Cabinet ministers were also expected to take part.

Another factor behind the summit may be worries that any turmoil within Lebanon could expand into conflict with Israel, which fought a 2006 war with Hezbollah.

Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah's announcement that his militia members would be implicated in Hariri's slaying appeared to be an attempt to undercut the repercussions of any indictment, and he dismissed the international tribunal as an "Israeli plot."

Hezbollah said it supports Friday's summit.

Hezbollah has immediate concerns that go beyond the tribunal, however, sparked by reports that Syria sent Scud missiles to Hezbollah and suspicions that Hezbollah patron Iran wants to acquire nuclear weapons. Syria denies sending Scuds.

Hariri's death sparked massive anti-Syrian protests in Lebanon, dubbed the "Cedar Revolution," helping lead to the withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon in 2005, ending almost three decades of Syrian domination.

SHOTLIST

November 21, 2006

1. Tracking shot showing soldiers and crowd around Pierre Gemayel's car

2. Front shot of damaged car

3. Bullet holes in Gemayel's car window

4. Bullet holes in door on other side of car, zoom in to bloody interior of car

5. Soldiers making their way to scene

November 21, 2006

6. Wide of news conference room

7. SOUNDBITE (Arabic): Fuad Saniora, Lebanese Prime Minister:

"To your lovely parents, to your wife and children, to all who love you and to all free men, I pledge to you that your blood will not go in vain."

8. Wide of conference ending

9. Cutaway close-up of Lebanese flag

10. SOUNDBITE (Arabic): Emile Lahoud, Lebanese President:

"This speech was meant for the Lebanese, meant to congratulate them for independence day. But we were all Lebanese surprised by this criminal act that killed Pierre Gemayel at this time. Who ever committed this crime is following crimes that started with (the assassination of the) late Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, and because of this, I tell you, that at this particular time we have to be united."

++Night Shots++

11. Crowd gathered outside hospital

12. Walid Jumblatt, a prominent Druse politician in the anti-Syrian coalition, making his way through the crowd

13. SOUNDBITE: (Arabic) Walid Jumblatt, Prominent Druse politician in the anti-Syrian coalition:

"We won't let them divide us in Lebanon and the international tribunal to prosecute those responsible for political assassinations in Lebanon will come soon.''

November 21, 2006

++Night Shots++

14. Wide exterior of St. Joseph's hospital

November 21, 2006

++Night Shots++

15. SOUNDBITE: (Arabic) Amin Gemayel, father of Pierre Gemayel and former Lebanese President:

"Today Pierre died as a martyr for his cause. All I ask from the people who loved Pierre is to protect the cause, Pierre killed for the cause of Lebanon, for the cause of freedom.''

16. Amin Gemayel being consoled by Walid Jumblatt

November 21, 2006

17. Wide of people gathered inside St. Jospeh's hospital

18. Man with poster of Pierre Gemayel, shouting

19. Men chanting

20. SOUNDBITE (English) Gemayel supporter, Vox Pop:

"We will not forget him after some months. We must work together in a very progressive way and in a peaceful way also."

November 21, 2006

++Night Shots++

21. Various of angry protesters gathering and scuffles with security personnel

22. Crowd of supporters chanting with raised fists

23. Tilt up of supporters demonstrating with poster of Pierre Gemayel

November 21, 2006

++Night Shots++

24. Fire burning on the street, with soldiers monitoring situation

25. Pan across protesters gathered near the fire

26. Crying women holding photographs of Pierre Gemayel

FILE - Recent

27. Pierre Gemayel arriving in car

28. Various of Pierre Gemayel with father Amin, a former president

FILE - 1982

29. Various of Bashir Gemayel (uncle of slain minister) in military uniform on left reviewing militia with his father (in suit), Pierre Gemayel (grandfather and namesake of slain minister)

30. Various of funeral of Bashir Gemayel

November 21, 2006

31. Pull out to wide of fires in street

STORYLINE

Pierre Gemayel, an anti-Syrian politician and scion of Lebanon's most prominent Christian family, was gunned down Tuesday in an assassination that heightened tensions amid a showdown between opponents and allies of Syria that threatens to topple the US-backed government.

Gemayel, the industry minister, was the fifth anti-Syrian figure to be killed in the past two years and the first member of the government of Prime Minister Fuad Saniora to be slain.

Saniora went on national television to call for unity and warned of "sedition" against Lebanon.

"I pledge to you that your blood will not go in vain," Saniora said, eulogising Gemayel.

Lebanon's President Emile Lahoud called for citizens to be united in this tragic time, a sentiment that was echoed by Walid Jumblatt, a prominent Druse politician in the anti-Syrian coalition.

"We won't let them divide us in Lebanon and the international tribunal to prosecute those responsible for political assassinations in Lebanon will come soon," Jumblatt said as he offered condolences to Amin Gemayel, father of the slain minister.

Amin Gemayel, a former Lebanese president, told reporters that his son had "died as a martyr".

"All I ask from the people who loved Pierre is to protect the cause, Pierre killed for the cause of Lebanon, for the cause of freedom,'' he told reporters.

The killing has sparked condemnation across the world and from crowds of supporters in Beirut.

Emotional crowds gathered in the streets, with some angry protesters scuffling with security personnel.

There were fires in the streets as many supporters pledged to keep Gemayel's memory alive.

"We will not forget him after some months. We must work together in a very progressive way and in a peaceful way also," said one supporter.

Gemayel's fatal shooting will certainly heighten the political tension in Lebanon, where the leading Muslim Shiite party Hezbollah has threatened to topple the government if it does not get a bigger say in Cabinet decision making.

Witnesses said Gemayel was shot in his car in Jdeideh, a Christian neighbourhood, his constituency on the northern edge of Beirut.

They said a car rammed Gemayel's car from behind and then an assailant stepped out and shot him at point blank range.

Gemayel was rushed to a nearby hospital seriously wounded, the Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation (LBC) and Voice of Lebanon, the Phalange Party's radio station, reported.

The party radio later said he was dead, as did the National News Agency.

Gemayel was a member of the Phalange party and supporter of the anti-Syrian parliamentary majority, which is locked in a power struggle with pro-Syrian factions led by Hezbollah.

He was first elected to parliament in 2005 and was believed to be the youngest legislator in the legislature, where anti-Syrian groups dominate.

The Gemayels have been a political dynasty in Lebanon. The name is famous, and also infamous in some quarters for being a driving force behind the right wing Phalange Party - that fielded the largest Christian militia during the 1975-90 civil war between Christians and Muslims.

The slain minister of industry was the son of former President Amin Gemayel and nephew of Bashir Gemayel, a former president assassinated after the Israeli invasion in 1982 for his tacit collaboration with the Jewish state.

That assassination led to the Christian militia massacre of Palestinians in Sabra and Chatila in September 1982.

Pierre Gemayel's grandfather and namesake founded the Phalange Party in 1936 after a visit to Nazi Germany.

Gemayel is the fifth anti-Syrian figure to be assassinated in the past two years in Lebanon.

Former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri was killed in a massive car bombing in February 2005.

The journalist and activist Samir Kassir and former Communist Party leader George Hawi were killed in separate car bombings in June last year.

And lawmaker and newspaper manager Gibran Tueni was killed in a car bombing in December.

On October 31st 2016 thousands celebrated in Beirut as former army commander Michel Aoun was elected as the President of Lebanon, filling a post that had been vacant for more than two years and injecting hope that the country's long-running political paralysis would come to an end.

But the 81-year-old retired general who presided over the final bloody chapters of the Lebanese civil war and is a strong Hezbollah ally has an unenviable task ahead - forming a government out of the country's unruly political factions and dealing with an array of problems that includes what to do with more than 1 million Syrian refugees who have fled the war in neighbouring Syria.

Aoun, a Maronite Christian, enjoys a wide base of support among Lebanon's educated Christians, but is a deeply divisive figure for his role in the 1975-90 civil war and for his shifting alliances, especially with Hezbollah, the country's most powerful military and political force.

His election was seen by many as a clear victory for the pro-Iranian axis in the Middle East, giving a boost to Hezbollah and the Shiite Lebanese group's ally, Syrian President Bashar Assad.

Lebanon has been without a head of state for 29 months after President Michel Suleiman stepped down at the end of his term in May 2014.

According to Lebanon's sectarian-based power-sharing system, the president must be a Maronite Christian, its parliamentary speaker a Shiite Muslim and its prime minister a Sunni Muslim.

Parliament failed 45 times to elect a new president due to political infighting that led to a lack of a quorum as Aoun's bloc and allied Hezbollah lawmakers boycotted the sessions because his election was not guaranteed.

In the end, it took an about-face by former Prime Minister Saad Hariri, Lebanon's Saudi-backed Sunni leader, who formally endorsed Aoun for president the previous week - reportedly in exchange for Aoun promising him the position of prime minister.

***

Lebanon's newly-elected president, Michel Aoun, on November 3rd asked former Premier Saad Hariri to form a new government after he secured an overwhelming parliamentary majority to be named as the next prime minister.

Aoun's office made the announcement after two days of consultations with lawmakers over their choice of prime minister. The statement didn't say how many lawmakers supported Hariri for the post.

Aoun, a Christian leader and strong ally of the Shiite Hezbollah group, was elected by Parliament as president on October 31st, ending a 29-month presidential vacuum.

His election was made possible after Hariri endorsed him for president based on an understanding that Aoun would then appoint him as prime minister.

According to Lebanon's sectarian-based power-sharing system, the president must be a Maronite Christian, the prime minister a Muslim Sunni and the parliament speaker a Shiite Muslim.

The Aoun-Hariri deal is an unlikely partnership between rivals: Aoun, a long-time Syrian foe now allied with pro-Syrian forces, and Hariri, a vocal opponent of President Bashar Assad and the Iranian-backed Hezbollah.

Hariri is the son of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, who was assassinated in a massive seaside bombing in 2005 in Beirut. Several Hezbollah members are being tried in absentia by a Netherlands-based UN-backed tribunal.

Hariri was a political novice thrown into politics when he took over his father's political mantle after he was killed.

He headed a 14-month national unity government from late 2009 until early 2011, which collapsed after Hezbollah and its allies resigned from the Cabinet in a dispute over upcoming indictments in Hariri's assassination.

***

Lebanon's government on December 21st held its first cabinet meeting headed by a president in two and a half years.

The 30-member national unity cabinet was announced on Sunday nearly two months after new President Michele Aoun was elected.

Prime Minister Saad Hariri vowed that his top priority would be to protect the country from the effects of the civil war in neighbouring Syria.

***

Residents living in a Jewish outpost in the West Bank who face being permanently evacuated from their homes stressed on December 15th that they wish to stay, saying "this is our land."

Settlers in the Amona outpost rejected an offer from the Israeli government to leave the 50 trailers that they live in voluntarily, and face being forcefully evicted by security on December 25th.

The settlement was deemed by an Israeli court in 2014 to have been illegally built on Palestinian land.

Residents have played down any expectations of violence, although stones and tyres were piled at the entrance to the outpost.

"The land of Israel belongs to the people of Israel, we do not agree to give up one centimetre of the land of Israel," said Avraham Eliyahu Landsberg, a yeshiva student.

Violent clashes took place in Amona a decade ago after a partial evacuation caused unrest between residents and security forces.

***

Israel's Prime Minister lashed out at US President Barack Obama on December 24th, accusing him of a "shameful" move at the United Nations over West Bank settlements and said he is looking forward to working with US President-elect Donald Trump.

December 23rd's resolution by the UN Security Council condemned Israeli settlements in the West Bank and east Jerusalem.

Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel rejected the resolution that got the green light after the US, Israel's closest ally, abstained.

It was a jarring rupture with past US vetoes.

Although the US opposes the settlements, it has traditionally used its veto power as a permanent member of the Security Council to block such resolutions.

Netanyahu said he spoke with U.S leaders who vowed to fight the move, including from the incoming Trump administration.

***

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on December 31st said he was willing to work with US President-elect Donald Trump to try to bring about peace with Israel, based on a two-state solution.

Abbas was speaking in Ramallah at an event celebrating the 52nd anniversary of the founding of the Fatah party.

He also thanked the US administration of President Barack Obama for allowing the UN Security Council to adopt Resolution 2334, which declared Israeli settlements on occupied lands illegal.

The two-state solution has been the basis for peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians under the past several US administrations.

Trump, whose election platform made no mention of a Palestinian state, has indicated more sympathy for Israel's settlement policies than the Obama administration has.

Palestinians are now setting their sights on a MidEast peace conference in France next month in a bid to rally support as they prepare for the uncertainty of the Trump administration.

The Palestinians are hopeful that a strong international endorsement in Paris will insulate them from what they fear will be a close alliance between the president-elect and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

01:32:22

00:00:00

Thousands celebrate as Michel Aoun elected president

4063531

AP TELEVISION

Beirut - 31 October 2016

1. People holding newly elected Lebanon President Michel Aoun's portrait and waving flags

2. Poster of Aoun on a tower of the stage

3. Wide of rally

00:11:08

Lebanese president appoints Hariri as PM

4063996

AP TELEVISION

Beirut - 3 Nov 2016

4. Saad Hariri arriving at the presidential palace

00:16:16

Lebanon gets step closer to functioning govt

4072442

AP TELEVISION

Beirut - 21 Dec 2016

5. Wide of first cabinet meeting

6. Close of President Michele Aoun

7. Prime Minister Saad Hariri (left) and Aoun

8. Mid of Hariri

00:30:11

WBank settlers prepare for possible evacuation

4071441

AP TELEVISION

Amona, West Bank - 15 December 2016

9. Outpost trailers

10. Israeli flag

11. Various of people in outpost

12. SOUNDBITE (Hebrew) Avraham Eliyahu Landsberg, yeshiva student:

"The land of Israel belongs to the people of Israel. We do not agree to give up one centimetre of the land of Israel and we will not agree to that and even if sometimes you fall in battle, at the end we will win the war."

00:50:17

Israeli PM Netanyahu criticizes the UN and Obama

4072937

AP TELEVISION

Gaash - 24 December 2016

13. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu walking to podium

14. SOUNDBITE (Hebrew) Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli Prime Minister:

"The decision taken at the UN yesterday was part of the swan song of the old world biased against Israel. We are entering a new era and as the US President-elect (Donald) Trump said yesterday, this is going to happen much quicker than people think."

01:18:08

Palestinian leader welcomes settlements vote

4073715

AP TELEVISION

Ramallah - 31 December 2016

15. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas walking toward grave of late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat ++NIGHT SHOT++

16. Abbas at ceremony at Arafat's grave ++NIGHT SHOT++

17. Supporter waving sign bearing Abbas' image ++NIGHT SHOT++

18. Various of Fatah supporters clapping and dancing ++NIGHT SHOTS++

SHOTLIST

1. Various of traffic

2. People walking in street

3. Man by newspaper stand

4. Tilt of newspapers

5. Wide shot of As-Safir newspaper

6. Close-up of front page, picture of plane in sky

7. Headline reading (Arabic) "Lebanon regains its skies: the sea siege decision still waiting for agreement with the Germans"

8. Man reading newspaper

9. Newspaper front page

8. SOUNDBITE (Arabic): Vox pop, resident:

"The lifting of the aerial blockade over Lebanon is a positive step but it is not complete and this is a sign of weakness for the Security Council and the UN which are not able to have control over Israel and impose their power or implement the 1701 resolution."

9. Traffic

10. Wide shot of UN Undersecretary General for Legal Affairs Nicholas Michel at podium

11. Cameramen

12. SOUNDBITE (English) Nicholas Michel, United Nations Undersecretary General for Legal Affairs:

"We have discussed both the substance of the draft agreement between Lebanon and the United Nations, including the draft statute of the tribunal as well as the process to be followed, that is to say, the next steps towards the adoption of the agreement."

13. Cutaway of news conference

14. Michel walking out

STORYLINE

Residents of Beirut woke to the news of Israel ending its air blockade of Lebanon on Friday.

"The lifting of the aerial blockade over Lebanon is a positive step but it is not complete and this is a sign of weakness for the Security Council and the UN which are not able to have control over Israel and impose their power or implement the 1701 resolution," said one resident.

Israel ended the air blockade on Thursday.

An Israeli government spokesman also said on Friday that Israel will lift its naval blockade within 48 hours, once international forces arrive to monitor the seas.

The blockades were imposed at the start of Israel's recent war against Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon to keep the group's Syrian and Iranian backers from re-supplying it with arms.

They have severely hampered reconstruction of those parts of Lebanon battered in the Israeli military campaign.

Meanwhile, the UN Undersecretary General for Legal Affairs Nicolas Michel said he had discussed a draft statute of the tribunal to investigate the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri with judicial and political officials on Friday.

"We have discussed both the substance of the draft agreement between Lebanon and the United Nations, including the draft statute of the tribunal as well as the process to be followed, that is to say, the next steps towards the adoption of the agreement," Michel said.

The legal team handed Lebanese Justice Minister Charles Rizk a draft document on Thursday spelling out details of the structure and legal framework of an international tribunal.

Hariri was killed along with 22 others in a massive truck bombing in Beirut in February 2005, sparking massive anti-Syrian protests in Beirut and leading, along with international pressure, to the withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon that ended a 29-year military presence.

A U.N.-backed tribunal in the Netherlands is delivering verdicts Tuesday in the trial in absentia of four members of the Hezbollah militant group who are accused of involvement in the truck bomb assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

The verdicts were delayed by nearly two weeks as a mark of respect for victims of another devastating explosion - the detonation of nearly 3,000 tons of ammonium nitrate stored at Beirut’s port.

The Aug. 4 blast killed around 180 people, injured more than 6,000, left a quarter of a million with homes unfit to live in and plunged a nation already reeling from economic and social malaise even deeper into crisis.

Guilty verdicts could compound tensions in the tiny country. Hariri was Lebanon’s most prominent Sunni politician at the time of his Feb. 14, 2005, assassination, while the Iran-backed Hezbollah is a Shiite Muslim group.

The trial centered on the alleged roles of four Hezbollah members in the suicide truck bombing that killed Hariri and 21 others and wounded 226 people. Prosecutors based their case largely on data from mobile phones allegedly used by the plotters to plan and execute the bombing.

During the trial, which started in 2014 and spanned 415 days of hearings, the tribunal in Leidschendam, near The Hague, heard evidence from 297 witnesses.

Initially, five suspects were tried, all of them Hezbollah members. Charges against one of the group’s top military commanders, Mustafa Badreddine, were dropped after he was killed in Syria in 2016.

The remaining suspects are Salim Ayyash, also known as Abu Salim; Assad Sabra, Hassan Oneissi, who changed his name to Hassan Issa and Hassan Habib Merhi. They are charged with offenses including conspiracy to commit a terrorist act.

If they are convicted, hearings will be held at a later date to determine their sentences. As the U.N.-backed court has no death sentence, the maximum sentence is life imprisonment.

None of the men is ever likely to serve time as Hezbollah has vowed not to hand over any suspects. Prosecutors and defence lawyers can appeal the verdicts.

Hariri’s son Saad, himself a former prime minister, is attending the day-long delivery of the judgment and was one of four victims present in the courtroom for the hearing.

ARCHIVE: Beirut - 14 February 2005

++4:3++

1. Various of cars burning amid aftermath of bomb blast that killed Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri

2. Various aftermath shots of attack on Hariri's car, fire crews putting out flames

ARCHIVE: Beirut - 21 October 2004

++4:3++

3. Hariri walking to meet Lebanese President Emile Lahoud

4. Hariri meeting Lahoud

5. Close up Hariri

ARCHIVE: Date and location unknown

++4:3++

6. Various of Hariri at rally

7. Various of Hariri greeting people

8. Various of Hariri in meeting with officials

ARCHIVE: Paris, date unknown

++4:3++

9. Various of Hariri meeting French President Jacques Chirac

ARCHIVE: Beirut - 15 February 2005

++4:3++

10. Hariri's son Saad Hariri beside blast crater

11. Lebanese soldiers checking the site

12 . Various of Saad Hariri praying at the blast scene for his father

SHOTLIST

++AUDIO AS INCOMING++

1. Exterior of Baabda Palace

2. Wide of meeting between Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Lebanese President Emile Lahoud

3. Close-up of Lavrov, pull out to wide

4. Close-up of Lahoud

5. Exterior of Grand Serail

6. Various of meeting between Lavrov and Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Saniora

7. Saniora speaking

8. Various of Lavrov listening

9. Wide of news conference

10. Cutaway of reporters

11. SOUNDBITE: (Russian) Sergey Lavrov, Russian Foreign Minister:

"All of UN resolution 1701 should be implemented. The sea and air blockade should be lifted over Lebanon and the Lebanese army should be deployed in the south along with the UNIFIL troops and of course the two Israeli detainees should be freed."

12. Cutaway of cameras

13. Lavrov leaving news conference

14. Exterior shot with arrival of United Nations (UN) Undersecretary General for Legal Affairs Nicholas Michel

15. Various of meeting between Michel and Lebanese Justice Minister Charles Rizk

STORYLINE:

As part of the continuing diplomatic efforts to consolidate the ceasefire between Lebanon's Hezbollah guerrillas and Israeli forces, the Russian Foreign Minister arrived in Beirut on Thursday to meet Lebanese officials.

Sergey Lavrov said after talks with Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Saniora that each part of UN resolution 1701 must be implemented, referring to the resolution that ended 34 days of fighting between the two sides on August 14 (2006).

"The sea and air blockade should be lifted over Lebanon and the Lebanese army should be deployed in the south along with the UNIFIL troops and of course the two Israeli detainees should be freed," he said.

Lavrov also held talks with Lebanese President Emile Lahoud.

Afterwards he said there must a comprehensive settlement in the Middle East and an international conference would help achieve this.

Lavrov's visit comes after Israel announced that it would lift an air and sea blockade on the country by Thursday evening.

Israel had come under international pressure to lift its embargo, which had threatened to derail efforts to implement the UN resolution.

The embargo, which business leaders have said cost the country about 50 (m) million US dollars per day, was also hampering massive rebuilding efforts.

The lifting of the embargo marked a major victory for UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and it showed that with UN mediation, some of the outstanding disagreements might be resolved.

Meanwhile, the U.N. Undersecretary General for Legal Affairs also arrived in the country late on Wednesday to advance efforts to formulate an international tribunal to investigate the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

Nicolas Michel said he was in Lebanon to meet top Lebanese judicial and political officials at the request of Annan.

He said he hoped to be able to make progress in agreeing a legal basis for the establishment of a tribunal.

On Thursday he presented a final UN draft on the tribunal to Lebanese Justice Minister Charles Rizk.

SHOTLIST

1. Wide of police checkpoint outside Roumyeh prison

2. Mid of policemen

3. Zoom into car carrying the released suspects leaving prison grounds

4. Close of released suspect inside the car

5. Cars leaving

6. Tilt up of fireworks

7. People cheering, pan to man firing AK-47 in celebration

8. Women trilling

9. Men dancing

10. Man beating drum

11. Man distributing sweets

12. Exterior of AlMashari Islamic charity association

13. SOUNDBITE (Arabic), Sheikh Abdulkader al-Fakahani, al-Ahbash spokesman:

"We have known from the first moment that they were innocent and their arrest was not legal. The Lebanese justice released them today and that's what we were after."

14. Men cheering

STORYLINE

Three men jailed for more than three years in the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri were set free on bail on Wednesday, days before an international tribunal was to begin trying the case.

The judge did not explain his decision to release two Lebanese brothers on a bail of 500,000 Lebanese pounds (330 US dollars) each and a Syrian man on a bail of just 100,000 Lebanese pounds (67 US dollars).

The three could still be prosecuted in the case, although no one has been charged in the suicide bombing that killed Hariri and 22 others on a seaside street in Beirut on February 14, 2005.

Investigating judge Saqr Saqr's decision, carried by the official news agency, said four other suspects in the bombing - all pro-Syrian Lebanese generals - would remain jailed, which could allow them to be turned over to the international court.

As the news of the release of the Abdel-Al brothers filtered down, several hundred supporters gathered outside offices of Ahmed's faction in a Muslim neighbourhood of Beirut to await their arrival.

Some beat drums, others handed out candy, set off firecrackers or fired off pistols into the air in celebration.

A spokesman for the pro-Syrian Islamic group, known as al-Ahbash, welcomed the release of the brothers, saying it knew they were innocent from the start.

At the time of the assassination, the generals headed the police, military intelligence, a General Security agency, and the Presidential Guard Brigade.

The late Hariri had close ties with Western leaders and was credited with helping rebuild Beirut after the 1975-1990 civil war and trying to limit

neighbouring Syria's influence over Lebanon.

Following his assassination, Syria's army withdrew after mass protests, which also sparked political upheaval and violence.

The UN Security Council ordered an independent investigation into the assassination after its fact-finding mission found that the Lebanese

investigation was flawed.

The Security Council set up the mixed Lebanese-international tribunal in the Netherlands at the Lebanese government's request after parliament split between the majority and the opposition and failed to ratify an agreement with the UN.

The case has been handed over to the tribunal.

The first UN investigator, German Detlev Mehlis, said the plot's complexity suggested Syrian and Lebanese intelligence services played a role.

Hariri's supporters accuse Damascus of the bombing, but Syria denies involvement.

Two of the men freed on Wednesday - brothers Mahmoud and Ahmed Abdel-Al, a member of a pro-Syrian Sunni Muslim fundamentalist group - were detained in 2005.

A UN probe into the slaying said Mahmoud made "interesting" phone calls February 14, including one to former President Emile Lahoud, just before a truck bomb killed Hariri, raising questions about the president.

But the office of Lahoud, a Hariri rival and Syria's staunchest ally, denied the president received the call.

Lahoud's extension of his term in September 2004 for three more years, under pressure from Syria, triggered a sharp disagreement between Damascus, then a dominant power in Lebanon, and Hariri, who opposed the measure then relented before resigning two months later.

Ahmed Abdel-Al was named by the U.N. probe in 2005 as a "key figure" who had extensive contacts with top Lebanese security officials before and after the blast, and tried to hide information from investigators.

The third man freed, Syrian Ibrahim Jarjoura, was arrested in 2006 on suspicion he gave false evidence and misled the investigation.