Centric Bloc Is a Choice of Candidates and Voters
In an interview with ad-Diyar daily on Monday, Lebanese Forces MP Antoine Zahra said the existence of a centrist bloc was natural and would be a choice left to the candidates and voters to take.
Zahra said that Free Patriotic Movement leader MP Michel Aoun’s stance toward such a bloc was a reflection its importance, as Aoun believed the centrist bloc would be established at his bloc’s expense. Zahra said the alliances in the Metn would determine the track of the upcoming electoral battle.
Zahra also said he was optimistic that the national dialogue might reach an agreement, noting that the delay was due to regional factors. He described the dialogue as a “rational” discussion and hailed President Michel Sleiman’s approach to preserve national unity and state legitimacy.
Zahra stated that current developments, which included the new US administration, its prospective talks with Iran on its nuclear program and the Syrian political shift in response, would affect Lebanon. “The change in the Syrian and Iranian positions and their relations to the international community would reflect on Hezbollah’s domestic positions,” he explained.
About a possible reconciliation in the Christian community, Zahra said that both factions, in reference to the Lebanese Forces and the Marada party, had a media truce.
On the upcoming parliamentary elections, Zahra said that the March 14 coalition delayed the announcement of its electoral lists till after February 14 and assured that “the March 8 coalition would deteriorate in these elections.”
As for Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah’s call on the Lebanese Forces to reveal the destiny of the four Iranian diplomats, who were kidnapped in 1982 in Lebanon, Zahra said, “The Iranian state knows what happened. I want to clarify that the diplomats were arrested on the Barbara checkpoint and were handed in to [late former] Minister Elie Hobeika, and that is all we know.”