Lebanon’s deepening political crisis worsened today, with ministers in the anti-Syrian government fearing for their lives after an assassination of one of their own, businesses on strike and all sides ignoring calls for a negotiated resolution.

The coffin of Pierre Gemayel was passed overhead through the crowd into the church, handed from mourner to mourner, while in the square nearby hundreds of thousands of supporters unleashed their anger, burning pictures of Syria’s president and his allies in Lebanon.

Lebanon began to bid farewell to an assassinated young Christian politician today, and his anti-Syrian allies sought to turn an expected huge turnout at his funeral into a massive show of force against opponents led by the militant Shiite Muslim Hezbollah and their Syrian backers.

Lebanon plunged into fear and gloom today as mourners came to the mountain town of Bikfaya to pay thier last respects to a Christian politician, whose assassination threatened to push the country’s political crisis over the brink.

With Independence Day celebrations cancelled, Lebanon was engulfed in fear and gloom today as it prepared to bury Christian leader and Cabinet minister Pierre Gemayel, whose assassination threatened to push a country in political crisis over the brink.

Syria, Jordan and the US today condemned the assassination of a prominent anti-Syrian Lebanese politician.

Prominent anti-Syrian Christian politician Pierre Gemayel was assassinated in a suburb of Beirut today, his Phalange Party Voice of Lebanon radio station reported.

Lebanese Cabinet minister and Christian leader Pierre Gemayel was shot and seriously wounded on a street in a Christian suburb of Beirut today, Christian TV and radio stations reported.