Condoleezza Rice, the US secretary of state, blamed Syria yesterday for contributing to an "atmosphere" of instability in Lebanon following the assassination of another anti-Syrian Lebanese figure - the second this month.

"I do not know who was responsible for this," she said of the murder yesterday of George Hawi, the former head of the Lebanese Communist party. "But there is a context and an atmosphere of instability, Syria's activities are a part of that context and that atmosphere and they need to knock it off."