Visiting French envoy Jean-Claude Cousseran discussed on Wednesday with senior Syrian officials the latest developments in Lebanon, the official SANA news agency reported.
Cousseran held separate meetings with Foreign Minister Walid al- Muallem and Vice President Farouk al-Shara, in which he briefed the Syrian side the outcome of a conference of representatives of Lebanese political forces held in Paris last week.
Cousseran also reviewed the French efforts to narrow the view points among the Lebanese parties.
For his part, Muallem stressed Syria's utmost care to support what is agreed upon by the Lebanese, expressing readiness to exert all possible efforts to help the Lebanese reach an accord to solve their disputes on the basis of respecting the constitution and a coexistence formula that ensures security and stability in Lebanon.
The two sides also asserted the importance to develop Syrian- French relations in the light of the new term of French President Nicolas Sarkozy.
The French envoy told reporters after his talks with Muallem that the Syrian top diplomat agreed that the French initiative has helped conduct dialogue between the Lebanese.
Cousseran is the first French official who visited Syria since the 2005 assassination of former Lebanese premier Rafik Hariri, a friend of former French President Jacques Chirac.
France has been leading the international efforts to isolate Damascus after the killing as a UN probe has implicated senior Lebanese and Syrian officials in the murder although Syria denied any involvement.
France has also been playing a mediation role in a bid to settle the Lebanese crisis, the most serious one since the end of the 1975-90 civil war, where the government led by Prime Minister Fouad Seniora and the Hezbollah-led opposition locked in a fierce power struggle and the parliament could not hold meetings as a result of the rifts.
The opposition has been holding a marathon sit-in in downtown Beirut to press for the formation of "a national coalition" government and has branded the cabinet of Seniora as "illegitimate. "
The Seniora government, backed by the March 14 parliamentary majority coalition, had rejected such calls and accused the Hezbollah-led protest of trying to obstruct the creation of an international tribunal to try suspects in the Hariri killing and related crimes.
Source: Xinhua
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