Soueid sees hope in Arab and international attention
March 14 General Secretariat coordinator and former MP Fares Soueid commented on David Welch”s visit to Lebanon, saying the visit served “to confirm that Lebanon is still at the heart of international attention after the Arab community confirmed to Prime Minister Fouad Siniora that Lebanon is also at the heart of Arab attention.”
On Thursday, US Assistant Secretary of State David Welch met with Prime Minister Fouad Siniora, Speaker Nabih Berri and Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblatt. On Friday, he met with Maronite Patriarch Nasrallah Sfeir and Lebanese Forces chief Samir Geagea.
Soueid said Arab desire to resolve the hanging crisis in Lebanon met a parallel international desire through the immediate election of a president, free from “restrictions that some parties seek to impose on the election.”
In an interview with the Voice of Lebanon radio station, Soueid said he expected more support for the election of a Lebanese president in the Kuwait Conference, which France is said to be planning.
“The Arab world, which will meet in Kuwait, knows full well that the key to stability in the Arab world and perhaps also in the Islamic world begins with the stability of Lebanon,” Soueid said.
The former MP pointed out that the civil movements happening “in certain parts of Lebanon, particularly in Christian regions,” organized by municipalities and village leaders, are “an affirmation of the desire to end this crisis.”
Soueid said the scene in Lebanon today is an “inverted image” of what it was at the outbreak of the civil war in 1975, when Arab countries wanted to limit violence in Lebanon to protect their capitals. “Today, they are fully aware that the stability of Lebanon, the election of a new president and the regular function of institutions in Lebanon… underline and facilitate the stability of the region,” he added.
“Thus, hype that there will be a civil war and that there is an international or Arab waiver on the Lebanese issues has fallen.”