Syria-Lebanon

Damascus, 2005/10/24 - Thousands of Syrians rallied in support of the Assad administration Monday, on the eve of a UN Security Council meeting on a report that implicated Damascus in the murder of Lebanese ex-premier Rafiq Hariri.

"God, Syria and Bashar and that's all," shouted hundreds of students who marched toward the center of the capital, waving Syrian flags and holding up pictures of President Bashar Al-Assad.

"We will defend you Bashar with our blood and our souls," others in the demonstration chanted.

Some carried signs that said: "no to the Mehlis report, it is politicized," in a reference to chief UN investigator, German prosecutor Detlev Mehlis.

Damascus has denied any involvement in the February bomb blast that killed Hariri and 20 others on the Beirut seafront, and has rejected the probe's findings as politically biased, incomplete and "a big lie."