Lebanese premier Hariri stresses positives of visit to Syria

Damascus: Lebanese Prime Minister Sa'ad Hariri wound up yesterday a landmark visit to Damascus and talks with Syrian President Bashar Al Assad to open a new phase in improved ties between the two countries based on "openness and transparency".

Hariri, who has blamed Syria for his father's assassination in 2005, said he hoped that strategic ties with Syria could help boost matters of mutual interest.

"I saw all positive signals from President Al Assad in all issues and we agreed on opening a new phase in our relations," Hariri told a press conference at the Lebanese embassy in Damascus.

"The talks were excellent and frank," he said.

"It all depends on the future... We want to build a future that serves the interests of the two countries," Hariri said.

"President [Al] Assad stressed during our talks that the relations between Syria and Lebanon should be based on transparency and honesty," he said.

Hariri described his visit, which began on Saturday, as "historic".

Diplomatic ties

According to Al Assad's political adviser Buthenia Sha'aban, the meetings were "very frank and constructive".

Syria opened an embassy in Beirut in 2008 and a Lebanese ambassador arrived in Damascus soon after, opening diplomatic ties between the two states since independence six decades ago.

Earlier, a Syrian source who requested anonymity, said the "two leaders held a two-hour meeting and decided to build a new phase in relations between the two countries."

In Lebanon, the visit has raised eyebrows, where an already fragmented political elite found itself further divided between supporters and critics of the Damascus visit. Some have downplayed the visit as merely "ceremonial".

Former Lebanese president Ameen Gemayel, a heavyweight in the anti-Syrian March 14 movement, reluctantly welcomed the visit, but noted that the "wound is deep" and would "take a long time to heal", referring to the assassination of former premier Rafik Hariri. He believes Syria masterminded the murder.

Former Prime Minister Fouad Siniora, another March 14 heavyweight, was more optimistic and said that the visit will have a positive economic effect on bilateral relations between the two countries.

A source in Hezbollah said the visit was "very positive" and helped "ward off looming Sunni-Shiite strife in Lebanon".

‘Bite their tongues'

Al Manar, a Hezbollah-owned Satellite channel, said that the visit "rocked the ranks of March 14" and forced those who had been anti-Syrian to "bite their tongues". Aside from comments from Gemayel and Siniora, March 14 leaders have largely been silent on the visit.

Without doubt, the visit took a tremendous amount of courage, on behalf of both Hariri and Al Assad.

The Syrian President had to be forgiving to receive Hariri in Damascus, given the anti-Syrian rhetoric fired at him personally, and the people of Syria, by March 14 after the murder of Rafik Hariri in 2005.

As for Hariri, he had to weather a political storm from his allies in March 14, mainly anti-Syrian Christian leader Samir Geagea, who was already unimpressed with Hariri's newfound relationship with Hezbollah and the cabinet policy statement that promised to "protect the arms of the resistance in Lebanon".

He is now furious with Hariri's visit to Damascus, and according to observers in Beirut, "might soon walk out on the March 14 Alliance, seeing that it no longer achieves any of his objectives".

In addition to "breaking the ice" between the countries, the visit will have positive effects on Syria-Saudi relations, given Saudi Arabia's historical patronage of the Hariri family and its desire to see Hariri succeed in Damascus, and be warmly received by President Al Assad.

Elections

That, observers claim, will enable the Syrians and the Saudis to concentrate on what unites them in other Arab affairs like Palestine, Yemen, and Iraq in particular, ahead of the forthcoming Lebanese parliamentary elections in March.

Since 2005, both Damascus and Riyadh have wasted too much time on what separated them in Lebanon, rather than on what united them in regional affairs.

In addition to the open-ended Syria-Saudi honeymoon, which will have positive effects on both the March 14 alliance and the Hezbollah-led opposition, the Hariri visit effectively drowns out all talk about Syria having anything to do with the murder of his father in 2005.

The International Tribunal investigating Hariri's murder began operating in last March and has found nothing implicating Syria in the Hariri affair.

Many believe that had the UN found evidence to incriminate Syria, Hariri would not be visiting Damascus.

— With inputs from agencies