Introduction to the evening news 23-07-2012

Syria reassured the world on Monday that it will not use chemical or biological weapons in any internal conflict, saying that it will only use them in the case of a “foreign attack”.      

However, this 'pledge' brought on an opposite effect as British Foreign Secretary William Hague responded immediately, saying that Syria's threat to use chemical weapons against foreign intervention is "unacceptable”. Syria then turned down the call for a "safe exit”, with Iraq's endorsement with Russia's Putin reiterating the call for dialogue.      

On the Lebanese front, President Michel Sleiman took an advanced position and called on Foreign Minister Adnan Mansour to hand over a protest letter to Syrian ambassador to Lebanon Ali Abdul Karim Ali who in turn would relay it to Syrian authorities.      

His position comes in the wake of continuous border violations, the detonation of a house in Mashari al-Qaa as well as the shelling of border towns, particularly along the northern Lebanese border with Syria.        

On the Lebanese scene, dialogue was postponed until August 16 after March 14 declared its ongoing boycott of Tuesday’s session in protest of the failure to hand over telecom data and what it says was the newly-set "vague" strategy for the transfer of data.

For the full LBCI introduction, watch the video above