TIMELINE: Recent instability in Lebanon

(Reuters) - Anti-Syrian Christian lawmaker Antoine Ghanem was killed in a car bomb explosion in the eastern part of Beirut on Wednesday, security sources said.

The bombing adds to instability in Lebanon. Here is a chronology of the country's recent problems:

August 1990 - Parliament enacts Taif Accord, which becomes Lebanon's new constitution, bringing an end to civil war which had killed some 150,000 people since it erupted in 1975.

October 1992 - Lebanon holds first postwar elections. Rafik al-Hariri becomes prime minister.

May 2000 - Israel ends 22-year occupation of south Lebanon.

October 2000 - Hariri chosen prime minister again after popular discontent with economic slide.

June 2001 - Syria completes surprise pullout of its troops from Beirut and surrounding areas.

February 2005 - Former prime minister Hariri is killed by a bomb in Beirut. Two months later, under international pressure, Syria ends its 29-year military presence in Lebanon.

July 2006 - Israel strikes Lebanon after Hezbollah guerrillas abduct Israeli soldiers. At least 1,200 people die in Lebanon in 34 days of fighting.

November 2006 - Industry Minister Pierre Gemayel is killed by gunmen as his convoy drives through the Christian Sin el-Fil neighborhood of Beirut. All Shi'ite ministers resign from Lebanon's cabinet, skewing the sectarian balance in Lebanon's power-sharing system.

December 2006 - The opposition, which also includes the Shi'ite Amal faction and Christian leader Michel Aoun, begins an open-ended protest campaign in central Beirut to topple the government.

January 2007 - A general strike is called by the Hezbollah-led opposition to dislodge Prime Minister Fouad Siniora and his pro-Western government. Supporters of rival factions clash in the worst civil strife since the war.

May 20 - Fighting erupts in north Lebanon between the Lebanese army and Sunni Islamist militants of the Fatah al-Islam group. Thousands of Palestinian refugees are forced to flee the Nahr al-Bared camp where the militants are based.

June 13 - Anti-Syrian legislator Walid Eido and nine other people are killed by a car bomb in Beirut. The capital and its suburbs are also gripped by tension because of a series of smaller bombings, the first of which was on May 20.

June 25 - A car bomb driven by a suicide bomber kills six U.N. peacekeepers in south Lebanon.

Sept 2 - Lebanese troops seize complete control of Nahr al-Bared camp after more than three months of fighting which kills over 300 people. The battle is Lebanon's worst internal violence since the civil war.

Sept 19 - Car bomb in Beirut kills at least five people, including Anti-Syrian Christian lawmaker Antoine Ghanem and wounds four.

((Writing by David Cutler, London Editorial Reference Unit; Reuters Messaging david.cutler.reuters.com@reuters.net, +44 20 7542 7968, fax +44 20 7542 8648,)