BEIRUT, March 6 (Xinhuanet) -- Syria will start its troops pullback from Lebanon to the Bekaa Valley on Monday, Lebanon's Defense Minister Abdel Rahim Mrad said Sunday.

    Mrad told reporters that Syrian troops' pullback will start after the meeting of the Lebanese-Syrian Supreme Council on Monday.

    The pullback would start immediately after a meeting in Damascus between the leadership of both countries to okay the withdrawal plan that Syrian President Basharal-Assad announced on Saturday, he said.

    Assad on Saturday told the parliament in a speech delivered in Arabic that through the withdrawal, Syria will fulfill its commitment to the Taif Accord and implementing UN Security Council resolution 1559.

    The president said, however, the withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon does not mean the absence of a Syrian role in Lebanon, and the influence of Syria over Lebanon does not depend on the deployment of troops.

    The 1989 Arab-brokered Taif Accord ended Lebanon's 1975-90 civil war.

    But the UN resolution 1559, drafted by the United States and France last September, called on Syria to withdraw its forces from Lebanon, stop influencing politics in the neighboring country and allow Lebanon to hold presidential elections as scheduled.

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