ARAB AFFAIRS - Jan 9 - Mousa In Beirut To Push Arab Plan To End Lebanon Crisis.

Arab League chief AMousa arrives in Beirut to persuade rival political leaders to endorse a joint Arab proposal to end Lebanon's long-running presidential crisis. "Lebanon is in danger ... and we want to salvage the situation in Lebanon", Mousa told reporters at Beirut airport. "We come full of optimism, full of hope. The initiative is clear and we will start work now because time is tight". "The [Arab League] initiative is clear and I will immediately get down to work because time is running short and we need to salvage the situation", Mousa said on his arrival. 'Decisive stage' He said the Arab plan had received broad international backing and warned that Lebanon was at a "decisive stage". After his arrival, Mousa held talks with parliament speaker Nabih Berri, an opposition stalwart, ahead of meetings with PM Fouad Siniora and Sulaiman. He is due to leave Lebanon on Saturday. There is speculation that if Mousa leaves Beirut empty-handed, parliament session will be postponed like the previous attempts to elect a president, possibly until the spring. There is growing speculation that the vote may keep getting delayed until the next parliamentary elections in 2009, when the opposition could win a majority. The Arab initiative is based on a three-point plan that calls for the election of army chief General Michel Sulaiman as president, the formation of a national unity government in which no one party has veto power and the adoption of a new electoral law. Lebanon has been without a president since November 23, when Emile Lahoud stepped down with no successor in place amid a bitter power struggle between the Western-backed government and the Hizbullah-led opposition, supported by Syria and Iran. A vote in the Lebanese parliament to elect a new head of state has been postponed 11 times, and MPs are now due to convene for a fresh attempt on January 12. The Arab League plan is the latest in a string of international proposals to end the stalemate which is threatening Lebanon's stability. Hizbullah, which has insisted on having a third of the seats in a new government so as to have veto power over key decisions, has given the plan a cautious welcome. Hizbullah MP Muhammad Haidar said his party wanted to make sure that there would be "no winner and no loser". "We want to make sure that under the proposed formula, no party will be able to impose its decisions in the next government", he said. Also this week, a man purporting to be the leader of an Al Qaeda-inspired militant group which fought a deadly 15-week battle with Lebanese troops last year threatened renewed attacks against the army.