Lebanon calls for aid talks in Paris on Jan 15

BEIRUT, Oct 16 (Reuters) Lebanon, still struggling to recover from a devastating war with Israel, said today it would hold an aid conference in Paris on Jan 15.

''It has been decided, and this is the decision that the cabinet has taken today, that the conference will be held in Paris ... on January 15th, 2007,'' Prime Minister Fouad Siniora told reporters after a cabinet meeting.

He said that French President Jacques Chirac had said he was prepared to host the conference in Paris.

Lebanon was due to hold the aid conference last year but scheduling it was repeatedly postponed. Israel's war with Hezbollah in July and August left much of southern Lebanon in ruins and crippled the country's economy, reviving the urgent need to hold the conference.

Even before the war, Lebanon was struggling to rein in a public debt of around 38 billion dollar, whose servicing weighs heavily on public finances.

The International Monetary Fund has said it expects Lebanon's economy to contract 5 per cent this year after the conflict and estimated that Lebanon suffered 3.5 billion dollar in damage in an Israeli bombardment that began after Hezbollah captured two Israeli soldiers on July 12.

International donors pledged more than 940 million dollar in August for Lebanon's immediate relief efforts at an aid conference in Stockholm. The World Bank also said it had approved a grant of 70 million dollar to support the Lebanese government's reconstruction efforts.

REUTERS SSC BD1726