BEIRUT, April 10 (Xinhua) -- Lebanese pro-government legislators gathered for the fourth straight Tuesday, urging parliament Speaker Nabih Berri to convene the parliament to ratify an international tribunal on former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri's murder.

    In a speech at the parliament building, MP Akram Shehayyeb urged Berri, also a key opposition leader, "to attend"; saying that failure to hold a parliament session would lead to "negative consequences which would not be in the interest of Lebanon".

    About the petition handed to the UN requesting the world body to establish the international court, Shehayyeb said the move "is the only way to protect the tribunal".

    Last Tuesday, Saad Hariri, parliament majority leader and son of the murdered premier, delivered the petition which was signed by 70 lawmakers to Geir Pederson, UN special coordinator in Lebanon.

    Addressed to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, the petition requested that "all alternative measures" be taken by the UN Security Council to establish the tribunal.

    "It is a duty to open parliament doors," Shehayyeb urged. Lebanese parliament convenes twice a year in two ordinary sessions. The first starts mid-march until the end of May and the second from the middle of October through the end of December.

    Berri has declined to convene a parliamentary session and has refused to receive any documents referred to parliament by Prime Minister Fouad Seniora's majority government, which he described as "unconstitutional" since six pro-Syrian ministers from the opposition resigned in November, 2006.

    Lebanese political crisis has been for about five months, in which politicians traded insults and their supporters clashed in the streets.

    The disputes of the two rival political blocs concentrated on two main issues, namely the opposition's demand for a veto in the government and the majority's demand for the ratification of the international tribunal on the Hariri case.