Rival Lebanese leaders signed a deal on Wednesday to end 18 months of political conflict, pulling their country away from the brink of a new civil war and paving the way for the election of a new president.
Parliament will be convened next Sunday to elect army chief General Michel Suleiman as head of state, aides to Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri told Reuters in Qatar, where the rival sides signed the deal after six days of Arab-mediated talks.

Christian Lebanese opposition leader General Michel Aoun (l) shakes hands with Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora at the end of the last session of talks in Doha on May 21, 2008.

The agreement between the ruling coalition and the opposition resolved a dispute over a law for holding 2009 parliamentary polls and met the opposition’s long-standing demand for veto power in cabinet.
Hezbollah increased pressure on the ruling alliance this month by routing its followers in a military campaign. The Qatari-led negotiations in Doha built on mediation that ended violence in which 81 people were killed.
The deal included a pledge by both sides not to use violence in political disputes, echoing a paragraph in an agreement drafted in Beirut that ended the fighting.
It was Lebanon’s worst civil conflict since the 1975-1990 war and exacerbated tensions between Shiites loyal to Hezbollah and Druze and Sunni followers of the ruling coalition.
Hezbollah delegation leader Mohammed Raad said the deal would help “towards strengthening coexistence and building the state“.
“This is a compromise that if the Lebanese use well could be transformed into a solid agreement,“ said Talal Salman, a commentator in the pro-opposition as-Safir newspaper. “It redresses the balance in the no-victor, no-vanquished formula.“

Ali Hassan Khalil (c), political aide of Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, speaks with Hezbollah representative Mohammed Raad as he sits next to MP Elias Skaf at the last session of talks in Doha on May 21.

Power Struggle
The ruling coalition had long refused to meet the opposition’s demand for cabinet veto power.
Opposition ministers quit Prime Minister Fouad Siniora’s cabinet in November, 2006 in protest at the governing alliance’s refusal to meet the demand for veto power.
The resignations stripped the cabinet of all its Shiite members and upset Lebanon’s delicate sectarian power-sharing system.
Public support for Hezbollah brought more pressure to bear and forced the government to rescind two measures which the Shiite group viewed as hostile enough to justify a military response.

Parliament Session
Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency (NNA) said Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri had initially called the parliament session for this Thursday.
But NNA said the session has been postponed until Sunday because Arab and foreign delegations expected to attend would not be able to arrive in Beirut on such short notice.
“All sides agreed on the parliament speaker asking the parliament to convene within 24 hours to elect Michel Suleiman the consensus candidate as president of Lebanon,“ Hamad bin Jassim bin Jabr Al-Thani, Qatar’s foreign minister said.
“All parties pledge not to use force, weapon or violence to achieve political advantages,“ he added.
The agreement is a major triumph for the opposition, giving it the two key measures it sought in its standoff with the western-led government.
Those are the veto power in a new national unity government, and an electoral law that divides up Lebanon into smaller-sized districts, allowing for better representation of the country’s various sects.

Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei said political and ideological boundaries are similar to geographical borders.
“If these boundaries are enfeebled, then insiders may enter the realm of foreigners or foreigners and outsiders may enter the realm of the Islamic Revolution,“ Ayatollah Khamenei told a gathering of officials of the headquarters for holding Imam Khomeini’s 19th death anniversary on Wednesday.
The leader referred to the position of the Imam Khomeini, the late founder of the Islamic Revolution, as the pivot of Islamic identity and his constant endeavors for protecting these political and ideological boundaries.
“Before and after the victory of the Islamic Revolution, Imam Khomeini set the boundaries of the Islamic system through his writings and words. The most important issue is abidance by the boundaries and safeguarding the sanctities of the identity of the Islamic Revolution,“ he said.
Ayatollah Khamenei emphasized that the Islamic Revolution led by Imam Khomeini was an innovation in itself.
“This innovation was always detectable in Imam’s moves and approaches. Using ’Islamic Republic’ instead of democratic republic and using supreme jurisprudence instead of monarchical rule are among the innovations of the Imam for setting the boundaries of Islamic Revolution,“ he explained.
Referring to the superior means available to the enemies, including scientific, human, financial and propaganda considerations, the leader said, “Despite this inequality, whenever the Islamic state has been challenged by great powers it has triumphed in the end. This in itself reveals the high capacity of the Islamic Revolution.“
Ayatollah Khamenei noted that foreigners have admitted that the Islamic Republic’s clout in the region and the world is on the rise. “This is while we have not utilized all capacities of the Islamic Revolution. If we go full force, then the sky is the limit,“ he said.

One of the Shiite authorities in Iraq, Ayatollah Seyyed Kazem Haeri, lambasted the security agreement reached between the US and Iraq on Wednesday.
“Acceptance of this agreement will humiliate the people of Iraq forever,“ the ayatollah said in a statement, a copy of which was dispatched to Fars News Agency.
Haeri emphasized that America’s goal is to continue to loot Iraq’s assets.
“Everybody knows that the US intends to give the impression that its illegitimate presence in our country is legal so that it can more readilyÉspread poverty and oppression in Iraq. They (Americans) want an American dog in Iraq to be immune to any form of trial by the (Iraqi) government and nation, and all (Iraqi) political and lawmaking institutions, including the president, prime minister, lawmakers and the people, to be accountable to Americans,“ he said.
The senior Iraqi cleric recalled that nobody in the world should get the idea that they could make plots against Iraq because of the huge problems of its people, as Iraqis have learned from the holy Prophet (PBUH) not to succumb to humiliation.
Haeri went on to urge the people of Iraq to unite against the plots of enemies.

May 23 coincides with the liberation of the city of Khorramshahr from Iraqi occupation in 1982, which was a manifestation of ational unity. On this day, Khorramshahr was liberated by Iranian combatants after 578 days of occupation.