BEIRUT, 26 April 2005 — Lebanon’s most powerful pro-Syrian security chief resigned yesterday, hours before the last Syrian forces were due to leave their tiny neighbor and end Damascus’ 29-year domination.
“Security chiefs are usually appointed with politics and change when it changes,” Jamil Al-Sayyed, head of the General Security, said in his resignation letter.
Sayyed said last week he was ready to step aside during a UN-ordered international investigation into the Feb. 14 assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, which sparked furious protests against the Syrians many blamed for the killing.
Syria bowed to international and Lebanese pressure last month and began pulling its 14,000 troops and many more spies from Lebanon. Only a few hundred remain in the eastern Bekaa Valley, where the Lebanese Army prepared yesterday to take over the Syrian intelligence headquarters in the town of Anjar.
Protests by Lebanon’s anti-Syrian opposition toppled the pro-Syrian government in the wake of Hariri’s death. Their further demands for security chiefs to resign and for an international probe into Hariri’s killing are now being realized.
The chief of police, Ali Hajj, last week put himself at the disposal of the interior minister, effectively stepping down.
Closely allied to Damascus, Sayyed has been widely considered Lebanon’s most powerful security figure since the end of the 1975-1990 civil war, when he played a crucial role in rebuilding the security organs that helped restore stability.
But many Lebanese politicians complain he used his position to impose Syria’s influence over political life in Lebanon.
Syria withdrew hundreds of troops on Sunday, burning documents, demolishing walls and filling bunkers as it abandoned its last military positions in the Bekaa, witnesses said.
At least 150 vehicles carrying troops, tanks and artillery crossed the border during the afternoon, they said.
The Lebanese Army yesterday took over the last Syrian intelligence checkpoints, witnesses said. Lebanese forces were expected to be in control of its Anjar headquarters by the end of the day, security sources said.
“There are a couple of hundred left,” one security source said. “A few will leave today. Tomorrow they will all be gone.”
Rustum Ghazaleh, Syria’s intelligence chief in Lebanon, and a token Syrian force will be the last to leave after a farewell ceremony in the Bekaa today, security sources said, hours before the United Nations issues a report on whether Syria is complying with a Security Council demand that it withdraw.
