CAIRO (AFP) - Arab foreign ministers were holding talks on the Lebanon crisis on Sunday in the absence of Syria's top diplomat whose country has been blamed for the troubles of its smaller neighbour.

The meeting in Cairo follows days of lethal street battles in Lebanon which have stoked fears that a protracted political feud could break out into a repeat of the 1975-1990 civil war.

Djibouti's Foreign Minister Mahmud Ali Yussuf, whose country was chairing Sunday's session, told fellow ministers that "a number of steps and measures to resolve the situation in Lebanon have been put forward."

He called on the different parties in Lebanon to "exercise restraint and cooperate with Arab endeavours," stressing that the "Arab initiative for Lebanon is the only initiative on the table."

That initiative calls for the election of Lebanon's army chief General Michel Sleiman as president, the establishment of a national unity government and the holding of parliamentary elections.

Saudi Arabia, a key supporter and financier of the rump Western-backed government of Prime Minister Fuad Siniora, had led calls for the meeting in the wake of the fighting that left 16 people dead in Lebanon on Saturday alone.

Saudi Arabia and fellow regional heavyweight, Egypt, have been strong supporters of the Lebanese premier and blamed Shiite militant group Hezbollah and its Syrian and Iranian allies for the latest confrontation.

Lebanese soldiers deployed in the northern city of Tripoli on Sunday after fierce battles between rival clans as the Hezbollah-led opposition handed over control of west Beirut to the army.

Lebanon's long-running political standoff, which first erupted in November 2006 when six pro-Syrian ministers quit the cabinet, has left it without a president since November, when Damascus protege Emile Lahoud stepped down at the end of his term of office.

The crisis in Lebanon is widely seen as an extension of the confrontation pitting the United States and its Arab allies against Syria and Iran.

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