Beirut – “Al-Quds Al-Arabi”: The Lebanese Prime Minister concluded Najib Mikati A visit to Qatar, where he participated in the opening session of the “Doha Forum” and met the Emir of Qatar Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani The Prime Minister of Qatar, Sheikh Khalid bin Khalifa bin Abdulaziz Al Thani, stressed the importance of bridging the rifts in the Lebanese-Arab relations, particularly with the Gulf states.
Mikati held a meeting with the Executive Director of the International Monetary Fund, Kristalina Georgieva, on the eve of the arrival of a high-ranking delegation from the Fund to Beirut to complete the discussion with the government on the reform cooperation program with Lebanon.
Prime Minister Mikati said, “The government is striving to restore recovery to the Lebanese economy, and that will appear soon.” “We have several problems that we, as a government, are trying to address, especially food security, which we seek to secure, in addition to following up on financial and economic matters,” he said.
He reiterated Lebanon’s “Arab affiliation”, pointing out that “we need Arab sponsorship, for the void can only be filled by those who made a mistake regarding Lebanon, but we are fully aware that Qatar is on our side and all the Arab countries and the Gulf states in particular will restore their relations with our country and we need these developments,” revealing “The Qatari Foreign Minister will visit Lebanon soon.”
Capital Control
Mikati’s return comes at a time when Parliament is preparing to discuss the “Capital Control” law, in light of differences that have begun to appear over the proposed project’s formula. The excellent Ja’fari Mufti, Sheikh Ahmed Qabalan, warned against “placing any bastard law around the capital control to protect the banking mafia and legitimize the swallowing of people’s deposits, and the international monetary conditions should go to hell, because the country is in the midst of an existential financial, monetary and living disaster.”
He addressed what he called the “group of foreign interests” by saying, “Land starvation, the living disaster that grinds people between the lanes, and the economy is the victim of the worst political, financial, monetary and commercial corruption in Lebanon’s history, and the story of there is no choice but the IMF and succumbing to its teeth just as mourning Zelensky yesterday in front of the hypocrisy of Atlantic and Washington, What is required of the government is to float the national currency and not to search for a way to protect the heads that have come to be harvested.”
As for the invitation of the Governor of the Banque du Liban, Riad Salameh, to the cabinet session next Wednesday, on the eve of his interrogation session with the investigating judge, a question mark is raised about the position of the ministers of the Covenant and the Free Patriotic Movement in light of news about the possibility of the ministers of the current and Hezbollah boycotting the session in the event of the ruler’s presence.
Where are the honorable judges?
And on another judicial line, and after the prosecution against the head of the Lebanese Forces Party Samir Geagea By the government commissioner to the military court, Fadi Akiki, was an advanced position for the Maronite Patriarch Mar Beshara Boutros Al-Rahi The one who asked, “What are you political officials doing, were you in power or not? What are you doing to shorten this dark and unjust night in which you put Lebanon, its people and its institutions? And we ask: Will the night of crises, strife and hatred be resolved? As for the night of the collapse, the leakage of borders, the revenues of airport customs, ports, taxes, bills, and the chaos of security, will it end? As for the night of poverty, hunger, and unemployment, that it vanishes? As for the night of the selective, retaliatory, electoral, politicized, and pre-compounded judiciary, to clear up? Is it not for the night to fabricate accusations and lawsuits, and to remain silent about other bright ones, to clear up? As for the night of freezing the investigation into the Beirut port bombing crime to clear up? As for the night leaving the state and legitimacy and the army cleared? As for the night of hegemony, falsehood, and disruption of the constitution, order, and charter, will it be cleared? As for the nightfall of the main institutions and banks, the seizure of depositors’ money, and the beating of the free economy, that it ends? As for the night coloring everything with sectarianism and sectarianism to clear up? As for the night to obliterate the reality of Lebanon’s deadly political disease to clear up? As for the concept of the state to be clear with its three components: land, people, and institutions, and with its four functions: the unity of organized power, the unity of diplomatic relations, the imposition and collection of taxes, and the unity of managing public policies?
The shepherd asks whether the night of the selective judiciary and the night of the fabrication of lawsuits and accusations will be cleared?
Al-Rahi added, in reference to Judge Ghada Aoun’s lawsuit against the journalist Marcel Ghanem, “How long do you officials and those involved in political affairs continue to subjugate our people, preventing them from expressing, complaining, opposing and raising their heads, and blowing up solutions, to clamp down on Lebanon? No, the right to express an opinion is born with the human being and is guaranteed by our constitution in Lebanon. Beware of harming him and transferring the country to an authoritarian and police atmosphere similar to the defunct totalitarian regimes. These repressive methods do not resemble Lebanon, which spent its history defending freedoms, which is its message, that persistence in repression establishes a popular uprising whose extent and results no one can predict.”
And he continued: “In the face of the sad and dangerous situation of the judiciary, we ask: Where are the honorable judges? Where are the judicial references not performing their final duties to protect the judicial body? Where is the authority that does not deter itself from exploiting some judges and does not deter those who abuse its role? Is the aim of some shocking measures to create a reality that leads to the disruption of the parliamentary elections on time, and to hold the party responsible for this national crime that really wants it to happen? This constitutional entitlement must take place and be followed by the election of a new President of the Republic two months before the end of the term of the incumbent in accordance with Article 73 of the Constitution. The new president would raise the country, pull it from the axes to neutrality, and put an end to this collapse and destruction.”
He concluded by saying: “Lebanon is not the property of a class. It belongs to the people, history and the future.”
Who provokes the Sunnis?
Geagea had stopped at what he called “attempts to isolate, encircle, intimidate and abolish the forces,” considering that “the latest manifestations of which we are witnessing in the political, electoral and legal issues are attempts to demonize and obstruct the formation of regulations and programmed propaganda campaigns, leading to direct intimidation operations, such as assaulting billboards.” The elections, or against the residents of Ain al-Remmaneh with sound bombs, and the last attempt in this context, were judicial decisions that were created dead because they are against every law, and contrary to every justice, and they are just a new, desperate, failed attempt to tarnish the image of the Lebanese Forces, why the forces? Because they know that he seemed loyal.”
And he said: “To the one who laughs his fist or watches and says, ‘I did not belong to me’, or participates from under the table with yellowish laughter in the demonization of the forces, we assure him that the poor person does not know, and it is necessary for him to know, that, if God forbid, Hezbollah was able to obstruct forces, means that his turn will come sooner or later, and then he will remember the famous saying “I ate the day the white bull ate.”
Geagea implicitly directed the movement and the party, saying, “to the yellow and orange press, which promotes that the forces are provoking the Sunni street in Akkar or other regions,” pointing out that “the one who provokes the Sunni street is the one who supported the Assad regime against his people, not who was with the people.” The Syrian is against the executioner, and the one who embraced the Houthi under his cloak to destabilize Yemen and Saudi Arabia, and not the one who demands neutrality, then neutrality, and then neutrality, because Lebanon cannot antagonize the Arab countries. Whoever provokes the Sunni street is the one who besieged the Saraya and did the 7th of May and overthrew the prime minister at the entrance to the White House, took down the black shirts and tried to strike the international investigation and the credibility of the International Tribunal and hide the perpetrators until this moment, not the one who went down to the palace to support the prime minister in the face of Intimidation, moral assassination, and support for the International Tribunal.
The Socialist: The Magic of Counselor
The Progressive Socialist Party confirmed its rejection of the allegations against Geagea and the actions against banks and the media, Ghanem, and indicated in a statement that “the practices that occur in the use of some judiciary with political discretion have crossed all limits and are threatening dire consequences.” It is very strange how a national issue, such as the investigation into the explosion of the port, is frozen without any movement towards the truth, while other files move “with the magic of an advisor” sometimes to political and perhaps electoral harm, as is the case in the allegation against the head of the Lebanese Forces Party, Samir Geagea, and later on the right to media and freedom of opinion and expression under Populist names linger behind people’s rights.”