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Lebanese parties 'break the ice'
16/07/2007 12:10 - (SA)
Paris - Lebanon's feuding political parties "broke the ice" at meetings outside Paris, France's foreign minister said, conceding there were tense moments during the talks to ease a crisis that has put Lebanon's democracy at risk of breakdown.
The informal talks on Saturday and Sunday at a chateau in La Celle Saint Cloud west of Paris, organised by France with US and Iranian approval, had not been expected to bring any breakthrough in the deadlock between the Western-backed prime minister and the Hezbollah-led opposition.
The meeting was designed to simply to get the parties talking, and Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said they met that goal.
"I think they broke the ice," Kouchner said on Sunday. "I think they were very happy to talk to each other."
While talks the first day were sometimes tense, the atmosphere became more "serene" and "brotherly", Kouchner said.
He added that the parties promised to continue talking, and that he would head to Lebanon on July 28 to continue the process.
The meeting was the first time the 14 parties have met since a national dialogue conference in November that failed to resolve the tensions. Since then, the country's worst political crisis since the end of the 1975-1990 civil war has escalated.
Parliament and the government are barely functioning. Prime Minister Fuad Saniora refuses to step down and is locked in a power struggle with the Hezbollah-led, pro-Syrian opposition.
A former colonial power, France has strong ties with some of the rival factions and has hoped to use its clout to encourage dialogue.
- AP
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