BEIRUT, 1 March 2008 — US-backed Prime Minister Fouad Siniora said yesterday the Lebanese government did not request any naval support, hours after the US military announced it was sending ships off Lebanon. “We did not request any warships from any party,” Siniora told Arab diplomats at government headquarters in Beirut.

“I would like to make it clear that there are no foreign warships in Lebanese territorial waters. Only Lebanese Navy and those of the UN Interim Force in Lebanon that are helping Lebanon secure its waters under UN resolution 1701,” he said.

Siniora spoke after his Hezbollah opponents denounced the deployment of US warships off the coast of Lebanon, calling it a threat to Lebanese sovereignty and independence. A Hezbollah lawmaker said the resistance group would not be intimidated by the move.

The US military said Thursday the Navy was sending at least three ships, including an amphibious assault ship, to the eastern Mediterranean Sea in a show of strength during a period of tensions with Syria and political uncertainty in Lebanon.

“We are facing an American threat against Lebanon,” Hezbollah legislator Hassan Fadlallah said. “It is clear this threat and intimidation will not affect us,” he said on local television. Hezbollah is leading the opposition seeking to topple the US-backed government in Beirut.

Lebanon’s long political crisis is increasingly viewed as taking on a regional scope — a proxy confrontation between the United States and some of its Arab allies on one side and Iran and Syria, staunch opponents of America’s Middle East policies. Neighboring Syria was yet to react yesterday. Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters Thursday the deployment should not be viewed as threatening or in response to events in any single country in the volatile region.

But the decision appeared to be a not-too-subtle show of US force in the region as international frustration mounts over a long political deadlock in tiny, weak Lebanon. The United States blames Syria for the impasse, saying Syria has never given up its ambitions to control its smaller neighbor.

The presidential election in Lebanon has been delayed 15 times. Just this week the date was pushed back to March 11. The opposition accuses the US of scuttling any attempts to settle the political crisis over the president and government that has dragged on for the last 15 months.