Forces of Change requested an emergency session to Parliament to discuss the issue of demarcation of Lebanese borders and review the maritime border agreement in accordance with Article 52 of the Lebanese Constitution. (Credit: Ibrahim Mneimneh/Twitter)
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"We are surely heading towards a presidential vacancy," Progressive Socialist Party MP Marwan Hamadeh said after Parliament failed to reach the two-thirds quorum required to hold yesterday’s presidential election session. Only 17 days remain before the end of President Michel Aoun’s term on Oct. 31, but only 71 of Parliament’s 128 MPs attended yesterday’s session. MPs from the Strong Lebanon bloc (17 Free Patriotic Movement MPs and three Armenian MPs from the Tashnag party) boycotted the session, claiming the date coincides with the 22-year memorial of Syrian troops ousting FPM founder and then-army-Chief-cum-Prime-Minister Michel Aoun from Baabda Palace — the commemoration being "more important than anything else," according to FPM leader Gebran Bassil. "It is not in their interest to hold the session since they have not yet chosen a candidate," Kataeb leader Sami Gemayel said, echoing Lebanese Forces MP Georges Adwan’s criticisms of FPM, Hezbollah and allied MPs — who comprise the majority of the session’s absentees. The absent MPs cast blank ballots in the first election round. Forces of Change MP Mark Daou said his bloc, which met with several parliamentary blocs prior to the elections in an attempt to establish a consensus on the next head of state, has "a basket with names" for viable presidential candidates and that other MPs are welcome to choose a candidate from this basket. "What is essential is to unite the opposition around a proposal and a project, before entering the game of names," Zgharta MP Michel Moawad said, adding that he rallied additional supporters for his presidential candidacy following the first voting round. Moawad was the leading candidate during the first ballot, receiving 36 votes, despite more than half the ballots being cast as protest votes.
Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri ordered the distribution of the maritime border agreement to MPs once it is approved by the government, following demands from Forces of Change MPs that the text “be submitted to Parliament for a vote.” Kataeb MPs and international law experts also said a parliamentary review of the agreement is necessary, per the regulations in international treaties and Article 52 of the Constitution. Opposing opinions consider the agreement a “unilateral act” which omits the need for Parliament’s approval. “The European Union welcomes the announcement of an agreement in the negotiations between Lebanon and Israel on the delineation of their maritime boundary," a Wednesday statement from the union read, after officials from both sides expressed their approval of a US-mediated proposal following two years of intense negotiations. UK Ambassador to Lebanon Hamish Cowell also spoke with L’Orient Today in an exclusive interview since he took up his post, saying the deal is a “signal of hope” and of a “potential income from hydrocarbons.” Lebanon’s President Aoun, in a televised speech on Thursday evening, said, "I hope [the deal] will be a promising start that will lay the foundations for the economic jumpstart Lebanon needs."
The Lebanese judiciary separately ordered the release of two depositors detained after forcibly withdrawing their own funds from banks in southern Lebanon. According to L’Orient Today’s correspondent in the region, Nabatieh's acting investigative judge Ahmad Mezher set a LL3 million bail for Yahia Ali Badreddine, who held up a Bankmed branch in Nabatieh, South Lebanon, with a gun demanding access to his blocked savings. He managed to withdraw less than a tenth of his deposit in US dollars and the remaining funds at an exchange rate of LL8,000 to the dollar — almost a fifth of the parallel market exchange rate. Similarly, the Association of Depositors in Lebanon announced the release of Ali Hassan Hedrej, who turned himself in to Internal Security Forces after an armed withdrawal from a Sour branch of Byblos Bank. The judiciary ordered the release of several bank holdup perpetrators on bail, while a number of banks have dropped charges against the assailants. Nonetheless, depositors who held up banks might remain in legal jeopardy. In the wake of these incidents, banks indefinitely closed their doors last Friday and are providing reduced services.
“We are waiting for a response from the Syrian authorities to decide the return date” for Syrian refugees in Lebanon, General Security Chief Abbas Ibrahim said yesterday. The first return trip will involve 1,600 people, Ibrahim announced in a Thursday meeting with the Press Editors' Syndicate, following July’s initial talks of mass repatriation with the goal of returning “15,000 displaced people per month.” Caretaker Minister of the Displaced Issam Charafedinne claimed the repatriation plan on “voluntary return.” "We will not wait for a green light from [the international community] to resume the returns, and no one has given us permission before," Ibrahim said. The official stance of the UN and the international community is that Syria is not safe for mass returns, but the General Security chief added that international actors’ sentiments on the plan "could change" due to the increasing number of migration attempts from Lebanese coasts. Syrian nationals comprise a large number of irregular migrants departing Lebanon toward Europe to escape increasingly deplorable living circumstances.
French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna arrived in Lebanon last night to “reiterate France’s commitment to the proper functioning of Lebanon’s institutions” and “pay tribute to the historic agreement on the delimitation of the maritime border,” the French Embassy in Lebanon told L'Orient Today. Colonna is scheduled to meet with President Michel Aoun, in the presence of her counterpart, Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib. The French foreign minister will also meet with caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati and Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri. The French Embassy added that Colonna’s visit aims to emphasize the urgency of a fully-formed government to “implement the economic and financial reforms provided for in the agreement signed in April with the International Monetary Fund.” IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva said during a press conference yesterday that the agency "cannot do anything until reforms are carried out,” adding that an implementation “delay could prove costly for the country." UK Ambassador Hamish Cowell, in an interview with L’Orient Today, said that although the IMF agreement alone is not a “magic wand” for Lebanon’s challenges, “it would send a really important message that Lebanon has reached a turning point, that there’s a new direction.” A report by an IMF delegation after a visit last month found Lebanon in a "severe depression" and that, "despite the urgency," little progress has been made to implement the necessary reforms.
In case you missed it, here's our must-read story from yesterday: “The courage to be yourself: LGBTQ+ voices emerge from the shadows.”
Compiled by Abbas Mahfouz