Fighting rocks Beirut, five die

Fierce clashes have raged in Beirut after the Iranian-backed group Hezbollah said the US-supported Lebanese government had declared war by targeting its communications network.

Security sources said the fighting killed at least five people and wounded 12.

The street confrontations have aggravated the worst internal crisis since the 1975-90 civil war and exacerbated sectarian tension between Sunni Muslims loyal to the government and Shi'ites who support the opposition.

The UN Security Council called for "calm and restraint", urging all sides to return to peaceful dialogue, while the White House urged Hezbollah to stop "disruptive" acts.

Fighters from Hezbollah and the allied Amal group exchanged assault rifle fire and rocket-propelled grenades with pro-government gunmen in several areas of the capital in the worst domestic fighting since the civil war.

Security sources said Hezbollah gunmen overran at least three offices of the pro-government Future group. Many cars and shops were set on fire and scores of terrified civilians fled the hot spots.

Hezbollah launched a new street campaign on Thursday, piling pressure on the government after it declared the network illegal and removed the head of airport security, a figure close to the group, from his post.

Supporters of Hezbollah and its allies have blocked roads leading to the airport - Lebanon's only air link to the outside world - and other main streets, paralysing much of the capital.

The airport was barely functioning with only a few flights arriving and taking off, airport officials said.

The fighting erupted minutes after Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said the only way out of the crisis was for the government to rescind the decisions and attend talks to end 17 months of political conflict with the Hezbollah-led opposition.

"This decision is first of all a declaration of war and the launching of war by the government... against the resistance and its weapons for the benefit of America and Israel," Nasrallah said in reference to the government's move.

Lebanese governing coalition leader Saad al-Hariri responded by proposing a deal that would consider the government decisions a "misunderstanding" and refer them to the Lebanese army, which has been neutral in the confrontations.

Political sources said this would mean that army commander General Michel Suleiman could suspend implementing them.

Nasrallah described the fixed-line network that connects the group's officials, military commanders and positions as a vital part of the military structure of the group, which fought a 34-day war with Israel in 2006.

"I had said that we will cut the hand that targets the weapons of the resistance... Today is the day to fulfil this decision," Nasrallah said via video link from an unknown location in Beirut's southern suburbs.

Hezbollah supporters and pro-government loyalists had clashed earlier in the day in the Bekaa Valley in the east of the country, where five were wounded, security sources said.

The US ambassador to the United Nations said the Security Council should consider "additional steps" including sanctions if Syria and Hezbollah did not take steps to resolve the crisis.

"Hezbollah needs to make a choice - be a terrorist organisation or be a political party, but quit trying to be both," said a White House spokesman. "They need to start playing a constructive role and stop their disruptive activities now."

"It's double jeopardy: the cabinet can't retreat or it is practically finished and can't go through with it to the end because of the balance of power on the ground," columnist Rafik Khouri wrote in the newspaper al-Anwar.

"And Hezbollah can't step back from its position because it would be agreeing to getting its wings clipped and can't go all the way because of the dangers sectarian strife poses for everyone."

Hezbollah has led a political campaign against Prime Minister Fouad Siniora's anti-Syrian cabinet. The crisis has paralysed much of the government, left Lebanon with no president for five months, and already led to bouts of violence.

The group was the only Lebanese faction allowed to keep its weapons after the civil war, to fight Israeli forces occupying the south. Israel withdrew in 2000 and the fate of Hezbollah's weapons is at the heart of the political crisis.