BEIRUT: Lebanese President Michel Sleiman is pressing for all-party talks on forming a new government amid US pressure for assurances the country will be free of Syria’s influence, his office said yesterday.
Lebanon has been in crisis since police intelligence chief General Wissam Al Hassan was killed on Friday in a Beirut car bombing blamed on Damascus, and opposition leaders have demanded Prime Minister Najib Mikati’s resignation.
A high-ranking official saod Sleiman “has begun consultations with the leading figures of the country, in the context of the national dialogue, to discuss the possibility of forming a new government.”
He said if the envisaged dialogue “were to result in agreement on the form of a new government that can pull Lebanon out of its impasse, then Mr Mikati could present his resignation and the process of forming the government could begin.”
Mikati said at the weekend that he had accepted Sleiman’s request to stay on for the time being in the “national interest.”
Sleiman is now canvassing political leaders to assess whether they are prepared to join a dialogue.
The principal opposition March 14 coalition led by former premier Saad Hariri has already said it will not participate in any dialogue until Mikati resigns.
March 14 Secretary-General Fares Soueid said yesterday that Mikati must go.
“This government and the parties supporting it are facilitating the plan of the criminal Assad regime in Lebanon,” a reference to Syrian President Bashar
Al Assad. AFP
