Word: hariri
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...persuading 41 countries at a donor conference in Paris to pledge $7.6 billion for Lebanon's reconstruction. He is also pushing for an international tribunal that will put on trial anyone accused by an ongoing U.N. investigation of political assassinations in Lebanon. The killings of Siniora's boyhood chum Hariri, and of journalists Gebran Tueni, Samir Kassir and a dozen others since October 2004, have been widely blamed on the Syrian regime. The point of the investigation, he explains, "is not only to get to know who committed these crimes, but to protect democracy. It is not a vendetta...
...Prime Minister as a Sunni Muslim, as the country's constitution requires. But he is not a sectarian warlord or family patriarch of the sort that usually ascends to the dangerous business of being a top Lebanese politician. He grew up in Sidon, an enthusiastic Arab nationalist like Hariri, who tapped him to be Finance Minister during Hariri's remarkable reconstruction of war-battered Beirut in the 1990s. As Hariri's son and political heir Saad was inexperienced in politics, Siniora agreed to accept the appointment as Prime Minister after Hariri's Future Movement triumphed in elections two years...
Although the mild-mannered Siniora seemed destined for finance, Hariri's assassination, the Cedar Revolution it triggered and the exit of Syrian troops inevitably drew him into the regional struggles that have long made Lebanon a political battleground. Hizballah resigned from Siniora's government in November, accusing it of becoming a U.S. pawn that had reneged on promises to rule with Hizballah's agreement. The tipping point was the government's vote to proceed with the international tribunal over Hizballah's objections. "Our fear is that politicians will take advantage of the tribunal to get at us and others...
Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora, a mild-mannered former banker, has scarcely had a moment's peace since he took up his office in the wake of the Cedar Revolution in 2005. Though the protests triggered by the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri led to a Syrian withdrawal from Lebanon, the country's troubles have continued unabated. Siniora had to endure last summer's devastating war in Lebanon between Israel and the Iranian- and Syrian-backed Shi'a Muslim Hizballah group. Soon after the hostilities ended, Hizballah and its allies staged massive protests demanding that Siniora's government...
...president [Emile Lahoud] in spite of, let's say, the general conviction of the Lebanese that there shouldn't be any extension. Because this is contrary to the constitution. That led to further agitation in Lebanon that ultimately led to the assassination of [former Prime Minister] Rafiq Hariri. This created a tsunami in the country that led to the withdrawal of the Syrian troops...