PARIS - The re-appointment of a pro-Syrian politician as prime minister of Lebanon is not the key issue in the current crisis, said exiled Maronite leader Michel Aoun on Thursday, adding that the real problem was the presence of Syrian troops.
Speaking to AFP from his home in France as Omar Karameh agreed to return to his post as premier just 10 days after stepping down amid mass street protests, Aoun said it was not a bad thing that Karameh would be in charge of day-to-day business.
"That he is appointed for a second time is an affair for parliament, it's a question of votes" in the assembly, he said.
The choice of Karameh "is not the people's choice, because the people are on the other side," said Aoun, himself a former prime minister of a contested military government.
Commenting on Karameh's call for the formation of a government of national unity in Lebanon, the exiled army general said it would have little effect.
The key task was to solve the mystery of who killed former prime minister Rafiq Hariri on February 14, the event that sparked the crisis, he said.
"The outgoing government is itself suspected of having neglected its duties regarding the killing" of Hariri, he said.
"You can't just talk about national salvation and turn the page -- there's some business to be settled," he said.
Aoun is a former Lebanese army chief who was ousted and forced into exile in France by a Syrian-Lebanese military offensive in 1990.
Now 70, he commands popularity among Lebanon's large Christian minority.
03/10/2005 13:37 GMT