Siniora calls on all Lebanese to “commit to national consensus”
Prime Minister Fouad Siniora said on Friday that consensus among the Lebanese was the key to safeguard the country against all forms of foreign interference. Siniora added that the challenges Lebanon was facing nowadays were not to be compared with bigger and harder challenges of the past.
"The Lebanese have succeeded in overcoming more crucial challenges in the past … the struggle for power within the country is something that everybody can cope with as long as we commit to national consensus," Siniora said during the opening of the 52nd Arab and International Beirut Book Fair. More than 150 Lebanese and 30 Arab publishing houses are taking part in the annual exhibition, which will last for two weeks.
"The Lebanese should have no other option than the state … our differences should not be exaggerated and consensus should be our only way out of all kinds of differences," the premier said.
"Overcoming political crises requires commitment to the idea of the one state … any other idea would tear the country apart and take us to internal strife," he added.
Siniora cited the birth of the state of Israel in 1948 as the most difficult challenge that Lebanon has ever faced.
"This is not only because Israel had waged war against us on more than one occasion … not only because Israel had occupied and still occupies parts of our territory … but because the establishment of a racist and ethnic state is in itself a challenge to the Lebanese multi-confessional state which is based on the idea of coexistence," he said.
Siniora added that the Lebanese people had paid a heavy price to protect their freedom and identity.
"Today we find ourselves more committed to protecting cultural diversity and playing a pivotal role in facilitating dialogue between different religions," he said.
Also Friday, President Michel Sleiman told a delegation of Arab justice ministers who visited him at the Presidential Palace that the concepts of freedom and justice were interrelated. "The judge”s role is to tackle specific cases, while justice ministries are tasked with creating an atmosphere of justice … this atmosphere cannot be created without respecting all freedoms," he said.
The Arab ministers, who held their 24th annual conference in Beirut on Friday, were accompanied by Justice Minister Ibrahim Najjar.
Sleiman also received on Friday a phone call from Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who thanked him for the Cabinet”s recent decisions to recognize and establish diplomatic ties with the state of Palestine.
Meanwhile, Progressive Socialist Party (PSP) media officer Rami al-Rayyess was quoted by news reports on Friday as saying that a meeting between Hizbullah and PSP officials had took place last Wednesday at the residence of Youth and Sports Minister Talal Arslan in Khaldeh.
The meeting came in line with earlier meetings between officials from both groups.
"We are open to any meeting that contributes to promoting reconciliation," Rayyess told Al-Liwaa newspaper.
Separately on Friday, Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri received US Ambassador Michel Sison at his residence in Beirut.
Sison made no remarks after the meeting.