Former PM Hariri rejects calls for a Sunni revolution in Lebanon

Former Prime Minister Saad Hariri rejected on Tuesday the calls for a Sunni revolution in Lebanon, warning against any attempt "to undermine the Lebanese Armed Forces.

In a statement, Hariri said that calls for a Sunni uprising in Lebanon "are calls that have nothing to do with the aspirations of the Muslim community and the Sunni reality.”

“These calls are linked with suspicious plots to end coexistence in Lebanese in a bid to replace it with statelets  based on sectarianism,” he added.

Hariri also rejected calls for defection from the army and attempts at encouraging young Sunnites to join armed groups inside or outside Lebanon.

Such calls, he said, will not achieve results in the face of “national” communities in the northern areas of Akkar, Minyeh and Dinnieh and the Bekaa Valley in east Lebanon that provide a base for the military institution.

Hariri said that his stance from the Syrian revolution is based on the noble causes of the uprising that erupted against President Bashar Assad in March 2011.

Hariri stressed that “turning Lebanon into a scene of destruction similar to the devastation in Syria is one of the wishes of the Syrian regime.”

Lebanon is deeply divided over the war in neighboring Syria, with Sunnites backing the Syrian rebels and Shiites supporting Assad's government. Hezbollah has sent fighters to support Assad's troops while Sunni armed men in Lebanon have responded with attacks on Shiites as well as security forces, who they believe "are dominated by Hezbollah."

Hariri's statement came a day after the Lebanese army asked armed men in the northern city of Tripoli and nearby areas to surrender as calm prevailed over the city after four days of heavy clashes.

Troops entered on Monday the militants' stronghold of Tripoli's Bab al-Tabbaneh neighborhood, the area that witnessed some of the worst clashes, leaving scores of soldiers, civilians, and gunmen dead.

The army said troops arrested some of the armed men while others fled the scene.

Hariri also urged Lebanon's rival leaders to engage in swift consultations to agree on a new president and end the presidential vacuum in the country.

Baabda Palace has been vacant since President Michel Sleiman's six-year mandate ended in May.