Lebanon's army urged feuding politicians to set aside their differences and resolve the country's political crisis yesterday at the funeral of an assassinated general.

Brigadier General Francois al-Hajj was killed in a car bomb on Wednesday, the ninth figure to be assassinated in Lebanon in less than three years. He was the first military officer to be killed. The other attacks targeted anti-Syrian figures.

Francois al-Hajj, who had good ties to Syria's allies in Lebanon including Hizbollah, had been tipped to take over as army chief from General Michel Suleiman, who could be elected president by parliament as early as next week.

"In the name of your precious blood, we urge everyone to take a brave historic decision that would lead us to building confidence and communication between the sides and achieve reconciliation and consensus without any preconditions," Major General Shawki al-Masri, the army's chief of staff, told the funeral service for Brigadier General Hajj at a church north of Beirut.