Thousands mourn Lebanese MP

BEIRUT, Lebanon (CNN) -- Amid high emotions and tight security, thousands lined the streets of Beirut Friday to honor Antoine Ghanem, the anti-Syrian Lebanese MP killed in a powerful bomb blast along with four others.

Against an atmosphere of intense political and patriotic fervor, the flag-draped coffins of the politician and two bodyguards also killed in Wednesday's rush hour blast made its way through the city's Christian district to the Sacred Heart church on what the government had declared as a day of national mourning.

The procession was accompanied by thousands waving flags, as well as a brass band playing the anthem of Ghanem's Phalange Party, The Associated Press reported

TV pictures showed distraught mourners crowding and reaching out to the coffins as they were carried aloft. Several people were seen to collapse and had to be carried away.

Mourners also carried photographs, threw rose petals and unfurled banners, some of which read "We Won't Kneel," AP said.

The coffins were greeted at the Christian Maronite church with applause from the gathered mourners, the agency said, including majority leaders and the Lebanese cabinet as well as Ghanem's family and friends. Ghanem was later buried in the city's Christian district.

Ghanem's death is the latest in a series of attacks targeting prominent anti-Syrian figures, with the most notorious being the February 2005 assassination in Beirut of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, which sparked widespread protests that led to the ouster of Syrian forces from Lebanon. Hariri also died in a massive explosion.

The incident threatens to cast the country into political uncertainty ahead of a key presidential vote in a tightly divided parliament, almost evenly split between anti- and pro-Syrian camps. Watch how Ghanem's death disrupts Lebanese politics »

CNN's Beirut bureau chief Brent Sadler said that many Lebanese now feared for the future, especially given other events in the region including the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis, recent political differences in Iraq and Iran's bid to become a super power.

"There continues to be among a great deal of people here a sense of foreboding that perhaps the worst is yet to come," he said.

U.S. President George W. Bush, in a written statement, joined other world leaders in condemning the "horrific assassination."

"Since October 2004, there has been a tragic pattern of political assassinations and attempted assassinations designed to silence those Lebanese who courageously defend their vision of an independent and democratic Lebanon," Bush said Wednesday.

Also in a written statement, a spokesperson for Ban Ki-moon said the U.N. secretary-general "condemns in the strongest terms this terrorist attack."

"The secretary general urges all Lebanese to exercise utmost calm and restraint at this very critical time and to allow judicial procedures to take their course," the spokesperson said.

Bush's statement added: "The United States opposes any attempts to intimidate the Lebanese people as they seek to exercise their democratic right to select a president without foreign interference. We will continue to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the Lebanese people as they resist attempts by the Syrian and Iranian regimes and their allies to destabilize Lebanon and undermine its sovereignty."

The U.S. Embassy in Beirut issued a statement saying: "It is not a coincidence that these attacks target those figures who have been working to secure Lebanon's independence from renewed Syrian hegemony. We note with concern that many Lebanese politicians allied with Syria have in fact warned that murder and violence would be the results of any effort to exercise genuine parliamentary democracy."

And U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, in a written statement, said: "The bombing that claimed these lives was another act in a campaign of terror by those who want to turn back the clock on Lebanon's hard-won democratic gains."

"The world should speak with one voice in calling for an end to violence in Lebanon intended to subvert democratic processes in that country," Rice said. "Lebanese elections, scheduled to begin in just days, must proceed, in accordance with the Constitution, without threats of foreign interference and the violence that accompanies such obstruction." E-mail to a friend

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