Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati added fuel to the growing unrest in the country today, rejecting opposition calls for an international tribunal to investigate the assassination of spymaster Maj. Gen. Wissam al-Hassan in a bombing last week.
Anger over the Hassan assassination and opposition contention that it was carried out with the knowledge of the ruling Hezbollah faction has sparked sectarian violence across the nation, with 11 reported slain and the northern city of Tripoli looking to break into full scale civil war.
So far Mikati’s government is clinging to power, but President Michel Suleiman is said to be in talks about forming a new government and is meeting with blocs across the political spectrum. Whether anyone can form a government or keep the existing one in place in unclear, and as violence worsens the obligatory early elections may be difficult to organize.
The Lebanese Army claimed earlier today that they had reached an agreement with both Sunnis and Alawites in Tripoli for a ceasefire, but that appears not to have been the case, as fighting continued into the night.