BEIRUT: Kataeb chief Amine Gemayel asked Hezbollah Friday to recognize the authority of the Lebanese state, incorporate its arsenal within the army and hand over the four suspects involved in the assassination of former statesman Rafik Hariri.

“We call on Hezbollah to recognize the Lebanese state and its democratic system as the sole source of power and decision making,” Gemayel said during his opening speech at the 29th Kataeb conference in Grand Hills hotel in Broumana, adding that the responsibility of protecting the country against its enemies is the role of the Lebanese Army.

Gemyel also said Hezbollah must “hand over the suspects in the killing of the martyrs to international justice.”

Members of the March 14 coalition have intensified their criticism of Hezbollah in the wake of the collapse of former Prime Minister Saad Hariri’s Cabinet after ministers from the Hezbollah-led March 8 alliance resigned.

Division between Lebanon’s main rival factions deepened further when the Special Tribunal for Lebanon probing the assassination of Rafik Hariri indicted four Hezbollah members over the 2005 bomb explosion.

As Hezbollah continues to reject the United Nations-backed court, claiming it is a U.S.-Israeli tool, Marach 14 members including the Kataeb party, defended the tribunal as the only means to achieve justice.

Gemayel, a leading March 14 figure, warned that Lebanon was facing a “great crisis,” and urged political leaders to take responsibility and save the country from an imminent war.

“The gain envisaged by those who are involved in this scheme is one of two evils, either install the mini state or capture the entire state. Either way, this party is placing Lebanon in front of two evils: Sectarian strife or eternal division,” Gemayel said, referring to Hezbollah’s so-called “mini state” in its stronghold in south Lebanon and other Beirurt suburbs.

Gemayel accused Hezbollah of attempting to alter Lebanon’s identity, saying: “We have rejected Israel, the Syrian regime and the Palestinian organization’s projects [to alter Lebanon's identity] and we will not allow anyone to do so even if it accumulates all the weapons in the world.

“Before we reach the point of no return, Hezbollah should realize that its project will inevitably fail,” he said, adding that Hezbollah derives its legitimacy from Israel’s security threat against Lebanon.

“While the Arab elites are aspiring to a similar democratic system as Lebanon, some groups in Lebanon are trying to place [the country] in a backward political and uncivilized environment.”

Gemayel, whose son, former Industry Minister Pierre Gemayel’s assassination is also being investigated by the tribunal, ruled out the possibility of resuming national dialogue in the country.

“What is the use of dialogue about weapons when they consider it [the possession of arms] sacred? … What is the use of dialogue regarding the country when they consider the murderers to be saints? If the accused are saints, we wouldn't have martyrs,” Gemayel said.

He added that dialogue requires participants to be in agreement about basic, fundamental principles such as sovereignty and loyalty, and Lebanon does not have such consensus.

President Michel Sleiman has called on Lebanon’s rival factions to resume national dialogue in a bid to bridge the gap threatening the security of the country. March 14 lawmakers agreed on the need for dialogue but on the sole condition that Hezbollah’s arseneal is discussed.

Hezbollah, in turn, have said its weapons would not be an item on the national dialogue committee’s agenda.