Officials give OK to U.N. tribunal

Hezbollah officials and Lebanon's Syria-allied president criticized the vote.
BEIRUT, Lebanon (AP) -- The U.S.-backed government approved an international tribunal Saturday for suspects in the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, overriding the objections of Hezbollah amid a political crisis that threatens to spin Lebanon into violence.
Attempts to reach a last-minute compromise between the government and the pro-Syrian camp, led by Hezbollah, failed Saturday as the Cabinet moved forward with its meeting on the U.N-created court.
Lebanon's Syria-allied president denounced the vote as did Hezbollah officials, who warned that the Shiite Muslim militant group would go ahead with threatened mass street protests seeking to force the government from power.
The tribunal is key in the struggle between allies and opponents of Syria, which dominated its neighbor for nearly three decades until international pressure forced it to withdraw its troops last year. Anti-Syrian forces -- mainly Christians and Sunni Muslims -- dominate parliament and the Cabinet, but are facing growing resistance from the mainly Shiite pro-Syrian camp.
The political crisis became potentially explosive this week with the assassination of an anti-Syrian politician, raising worries of more violence that could tear apart the country along its fragile sectarian seams.
Rally at funeral
The anti-Syrian bloc brought out some 800,000 people for a rally at the funeral of the politician, Pierre Gemayel, on Thursday. Hezbollah has shown it can bring out similar numbers, and many people fear its threatened new demonstrations could start a spiral of street action.
Earlier Saturday, two key anti-Syrian Lebanese politicians met with Parliament Speaker Nabil Berri, an ally of Hezbollah and a Syria supporter, in an apparent attempt at a compromise.
U.S.-backed Prime Minister Fuad Saniora offered to put off the Cabinet vote for several days if six pro-Hezbollah ministers who quit the Cabinet earlier this month return.
But with Hezbollah demanding that the government be changed to give it and its allies more power, the reconciliation bid failed, and the Cabinet meeting approved a U.N. draft for the tribunal.
"Unfortunately, no agreement was reached because each side stuck to its position," Information Minister Ghazi Aridi said after the Cabinet meeting.
The Cabinet approval "puts the opposition before its options to confront the government. The time and the place will be decided," Sheik Hassan Ezzeddine, a senior Hezbollah official, said after the vote when asked if Hezbollah would carry out its threat to try to topple Saniora with mass demonstrations.
In the eyes of Hezbollah, the approval of the tribunal amounted to a rejection of its demands for more seats on the Cabinet, and Saniora's foes contend his administration is unconstitutional because it does not represent all of Lebanon's main communities.
"The government represents part of the Lebanese people, not all of them. Its decisions are void," Ezzeddine told Al-Arabiya television.
President Emile Lahoud also called the Cabinet's approval of the tribunal "null and void" for the same reason, according to a statement from his office.
Hezbollah legislator Hassan Fadlallah charged the tribunal vote would "deepen divisions in the country," and said the militant group would not take to the streets although he did not say when.
Saniora insisted the approval of the tribunal was not meant as a "provocation" against Hezbollah and its allies, according to a statement read by Aridi after the vote.
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