Word: siniora
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...Siniora's statesmanship seems to work even beyond Lebanon's fragile borders. In January, he scored a political coup by 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...
...Siniora's opponents can hardly be blamed for initially underestimating him, since little in his background prepared him for becoming the guardian of Lebanese democracy. He is an accountant and banker by profession, and he holds the position of 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...
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...
...vying for sway in the country, Washington is jousting with Tehran and Damascus over everything from Iran's nuclear program and Iraq's future to Arab-Israeli peace. "You have the desire of the Iranians to establish, I wouldn't say a satellite state, but something of that sort," Siniora says. "And you've got the Syrians. They are not shy about [opposing] the international tribunal. What is happening in Lebanon is because of turbulence coming from the outside, using Lebanese. We don't want to be a battlefield...
...Although Siniora welcomes U.S. support, he bristles at opposition taunts that he is America's agent, in part because his relationship with Washington is not always an easy one. Apart from criticizing what he terms Washington's "one-sided" support for Israel, Siniora became angry during the Israel-Hizballah war last summer when the Bush Administration rebuffed Siniora's expectation that the U.S. would support an immediate cease-fire. He calls Israel "a killing machine" that used Hizballah's capture of two Israeli soldiers as a "pretext" to re-occupy Lebanon. Though opponents mocked Siniora for kissing Secretary of State...