Lebanon’s Grand Mufti Sheikh Mohammad Rashid Qabbani Wednesday warned of “difficult days” if President Michel Sleiman’s term ended without a successor.
“Lebanon will see difficult days if a new president is not elected,” Qabbani said at the end of a visit to Bahrain.
A third round of voting Wednesday failed to elect a new head of state due to lack of quorum. A fourth round is set for May 15.
The Maronite bishops Wednesday criticized statements made by some lawmakers on a presidential void, stressing the need for the election to be held on time.
“We are worried by statements made by some MPs about a void,” the bishops said in a statement after their monthly meeting.
“It is as if they [lawmakers] are declaring themselves disabled,” the statement added.
“MPs need to elect a president according to the Constitution and ensure that their duties and responsibilities are performed,” they said from Bkirki, seat of the Maronite Church.
Paris is closely following the Lebanese presidential dossier. Just like a number of Lebanese, France hopes that there will be no vacuum and that elections take place on schedule. Saying that France supports a given candidate does not reflect reality, however; the country is keenly following what is going on between Gen, Michel Aoun and Saad Hariri, but without interfering.
El vicesecretario general del partido-milicia chií libanés Hezbolá, Naim Qassem, ha afirmado este miércoles que las condiciones políticas que atraviesa el país no son las adecuadas para celebrar elecciones presidenciales, por lo que ha advertido de que "no tiene sentido" seguir adelante "si no cambian estas condiciones".
"Si se celebra una segunda, tercera o cuarta sesión bajo estas mismas condiciones, el resultado será claro y no se elegirá a ningún presidente", ha sostenido, según ha informado el diario libanés 'An Nahar'.
Lebanon's parliament failed Wednesday to elect a president, for a second time in a week, raising fears the post will remain vacant amid tensions over neighbouring war-torn Syria.
Damascus ally the Hezbollah bloc refused to attend Wednesday's session, ensuring parliament was left without the quorum needed to vote for a successor to incumbent President Michel Sleiman.
Parliament speaker "Nabih Berri has set ... May 7 as a new date to hold a parliamentary session, given the lack of quorum on Wednesday", the National News Agency reported.
Lebanon's parliament has failed to elect a new president, in what is set to be a prolonged saga closely linked to Syria's upcoming election in June, political analysts say.
The parliamentary session began at noon on Wednesday. No candidate succeeded in getting the minimum 86 votes, or a two-thirds majority, needed to win the presidency.
Lebanon's parliament has failed to elect a new president, in what is set to be a prolonged saga closely linked to Syria's upcoming election in June, political analysts say.
The parliamentary session began at noon on Wednesday. No candidate succeeded in getting the minimum 86 votes, or a two-thirds majority, needed to win the presidency.
An independent Syrian lawmaker registered Wednesday as the first challenger in a June presidential election widely expected to return incumbent Bashar al-Assad to power despite a raging civil war.
Assad's government hit back at a torrent of international criticism of its decision to call the election despite the violence that has killed more than 150,000 people in three year, insisting it was its sovereign right to do so.
Assad has yet to declare his own candidacy but he is widely expected to stand and win a new seven-year term.
La abogada y activista Nadine Musa, la primera mujer que aspira a la Presidencia del Líbano, busca dar un "cambio radical" al sistema político para que haya una "verdadera democracia", mediante la incorporación de una nueva generación de dirigentes y la paridad de las mujeres.
En una entrevista con Efe, Musa muestra su confianza en el "potencial extraordinario" de sus compatriotas antes de que el Parlamento comience hoy a votar para elegir al sucesor del actual presidente, Michel Suleimán, cuyo mandato expira el próximo 25 de mayo.
Lebanese Christian politician Samir Geagea announced on Friday he will run for president in an election due next month, the first candidate to formally enter a race overshadowed by growing violence and months of political paralysis.
President Michel Suleiman's six-year term ends in late May. Parliament must approve his successor with a two-thirds majority.
The vice-chairman of Geagea's Lebanese Forces party, George Adwan, told party members the group's executive body "unanimously nominates party chief Samir Geagea for the Lebanese presidential election."
A consensus list brokered between rival candidates determined the results of the Order of Engineers elections Sunday in Beirut, while the March 14 coalition emerged triumphant at the order’s Tripoli branch.
Maronite Patriarch Beshara Rai met with President of the Central Maronite Council Wadih Khazen Tuesday to stress the need to hold a presidential election and avoid a political vacuum.
“His Eminence confirmed the importance of preventing any vacuum in official positions in the country, whether political or administrative … stressing the need for and the importance of the transition to presidential elections,” Khazen said.
The mutual admiration between U.S. Ambassador to Lebanon David Hale and Free Patriotic Movement leader Michel Aoun along with his permanent minister Gebran Bassil, currently foreign affairs minister, is no longer a secret among political and diplomatic circles in Lebanon.
Aoun, the head of the Change and Reform bloc, describes the ambassador as one of his closest contacts because Hale is honest with him, and says there will be no rivalry or political hostility as was the case with other American ambassadors over the last nine years or so.
Prime Minister Tammam Salam Saturday formed his 24-member Cabinet, bringing together figures from the country’s rival political groups and ending months of political deadlock.
Salam’s government will face a number of challenges including Lebanon’s deteriorating security situation as well as the upcoming presidential elections due on May 25.
All signs indicate that an all-embracing political government will not be formed soon given the unresolved row over the rotation of key ministerial portfolios, political sources said Monday.
“No government will be formed in the next few days because of continued differences over the rotation of ministerial portfolios,” a source familiar with the negotiations told The Daily Star.
“Contacts on the Cabinet formation have come to a halt in the absence of new proposals to break the monthslong deadlock.”
President Michel Sleiman is pushing to see a new government headed by Prime Minister-designate Tammam Salam announced before the former leaves in September for the United Nations’ General Assembly in New York, sources close to the president told The Daily Star Tuesday.
BEIRUT: The specter of an imminent U.S. military strike against Syria and fears of more car bombings dominated Lebanon’s political landscape Monday, overshadowing President Michel Sleiman’s plea for the formation of an all-embracing government to deal with security challenges.
BEIRUT: Representatives of the Amal Movement met Wednesday withFree Patriotic Movement leader MP Michel Aoun at his residence in Rabieh, a Change and Reform bloc MP told The Daily Star.
MP Ibrahim Kanaan said that MP Ali Bazzi, from Speaker Nabih Berri’s Development and Liberation bloc, and other Amal representatives visitedRabieh in the morning.
“They will likely hand General Aoun an invitation to the anniversary of missing Imam Musa Sadr's disappearance,” Kanaan said.
BEIRUT: Hezbollah and the Free Patriotic Movement remain at odds over a number of local and regional matters including Syria, MP Michel Aoun said in an interview published over the weekend.
“There are differences [with Hezbollah] over a number of issues, mainly over establishing the state, democracy, settling the situation of south Lebanon, the Palestinian cause and Syria,” Aoun told the pan-Arab Al-Hayat newspaper.
Aoun, who has previously defended Hezbollah’s military role in Syria, said his FPM opposed any military intervention in foreign states.
