Lebanon”s Berri sure army chief to be president
Lebanon”s army chief will be elected the country”s next president, Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri said in remarks published on Wednesday.
Berri, a leading member of the opposition, said rival Lebanese leaders had agreed on General Michel Suleiman, even if parliament has yet to elect him to the post empty since November 23 when the pro-Syrian Emile Lahoud left office.
“The story is over. General Michel Suleiman has become president of the republic,” Berri told Beirut”s An-Nahar newspaper.
The fate of the presidency is the latest stage in a power struggle between the anti-Syrian governing coalition and the opposition led by the pro-Damascus Hezbollah. Suleiman emerged in the last week as a candidate acceptable to both sides.
Agreement on a president would defuse a political crisis that has paralysed the country for more than a year and sparked its worst internal strife since the 1975-1990 civil war.
French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner, in Beirut to try to seal a deal between the rivals, was due to hold a joint meeting on Wednesday with Berri and majority leader Saad al-Hariri, a senior political source said.
Parliament has been called to elect a president on Friday but will delay the session for a 7th time unless feuding leaders can finalise a broad power-sharing deal, including the formation of a new cabinet.
Suleiman, 59, had been the consensus candidate favoured by the opposition. He has good ties with Hezbollah and was appointed army chief in 1998 when Syria controlled Lebanon.
The governing coalition declared its support for him on Sunday, dropping its opposition to a constitutional amendment needed to allow a senior public servant to become president.
Berri said Friday”s session was still on schedule. “The process of amendment, the election of the president and the start of consultations (on the formation of a new government) do not require more than two hours,” he said.
One of the new president”s first tasks will be to assign a new prime minister to form the new cabinet, which is now a subject of dispute.
Christian leader Michel Aoun, part of the opposition, is demanding guarantees that his share of seats in the new cabinet will reflect the size of his parliamentary bloc — the biggest of any Christian faction.
Maronite Christian bishops warned that more bargaining could hold up the election, prolonging the vacuum in a post reserved for a Maronite.
The bishops said in a statement that imposing conditions could “obstruct this election endlessly,” reflecting Christian fears that the post could lay empty for some time if there is no deal soon