Lebanon's political crisis deepened today as a depleted cabinet approved draft UN statutes for a tribunal to try the killers of ex-premier Rafik al-Hariri despite the resignation of six pro-Syrian ministers.
Official sources said the Western-backed government of Prime Minister Fouad Siniora would now send the draft back to New York and wait for the final text on the special court to return.
Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora arrives for today's cabinet meeting in Beirut. Photograph: Reuters
Environment Minister Yacoub Sarraf, loyal to Syrian-backed President Emile Lahoud, resigned shortly before the cabinet met.
Five Shia Muslim ministers from Hizbullah and its ally, the Amal movement, quit on Saturday over the collapse of talks on their demands for effective veto power in the government.
Nine of the cabinet's 24 members must resign for it to fall. A Sunni Muslim minister quit in February, though his resignation was not accepted, leaving 17 ministers in the cabinet.
Politicians and analysts said the crisis was likely to spill into street confrontations that could damage efforts to recover from a devastating war with Israel.