Geagea Says Depriving Lebanon of 'Christian President' a Political Crime, Rejects 'Autonomous Security'
Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea on Saturday described the continued presidential void as a “flagrant political crime,” rejecting calls for resorting to “autonomous security” under the excuse of confronting the threat posed by the Islamic State jihadist group.
“It is a flagrant political crime to vacate the Lebanese republic of its Christian president at a time Mosul and Nineveh's plain (in Iraq) are being emptied of their Christian residents,” Geagea said at an annual ceremony commemorating the “Martyrs of the Lebanese Resistance.”
“It is a complete political crime when some parties seek to 'behead the republic' with the aim of becoming its head, and when they take the country hostage in order to get the presidential chair as a ransom,” Geagea added, in an apparent reference to Free Patriotic Movement leader MP Michel Aoun.
Slamming Aoun's recent proposal on the election of the president directly by the people rather than by parliament as a way out of the presidential crisis, Geagea said some parties have “come up with a demand to amend Article 49 of the Constitution but they would not have made this proposal had their attempts to secure the election of their candidate been successful.”
“The alibi claiming that amending the Constitution is an attempt to secure the election of a strong president is a futile alibi,” he said.
“Do some realize that impeding the presidential vote will paralyze the entire political life and create social, security and economic instability?” Geagea asked rhetorically.
He said implementing the Lebanese Constitution requires the dissolving of “all illegitimate armed groups” and “returning the military and security conditions exclusively to the Lebanese state, in addition to approving a just and balanced electoral law.”
Turning to the threat posed by the ruthless Islamic State group to Lebanon and the region, Geagea rejected “all schemes of autonomous scurity, especially those that exploit the threat of terrorism ... to enhance the trembling positions of some parties on the domestic scene."
"Should the need arise, or should the IS come, we are ready for resistance, and we will only die on our feet," he vowed.
"Our martyrs did not fall to allow the presence of foreign gunmen on Lebanon's soil, nor the presence of Lebanese gunmen who serve foreign interests ... President-elect Bashir Gemayel did not die so that someone tries to prevent the election of a president," added Geagea.
"Our first and only choice is the state and its institutions, army and security forces. We will fight alongside it through stances, words, patience and endurance ... but we won't hesistate for a single moment to confront anyone who tried to transgress against the state through the forces of arms, whether it is called ISIL (IS) or anything else," he pledged.
Geagea described the Islamic State as a "new and suspicious phenomenon which has suddenly surfaced due to (Syrian President Bashar) Assad's 'magical tricks'."
However, he added that the group "has nothing to do with Islam nor with Arabism nor with all the principles of our time," noting that "confronting such a destructive trend is an obligatory ethical duty that everyone of us must perform."
“The IS is like a cancerous tumor that suddenly appeared in certain parts of Syria and Iraq and it is still limited. Therefore, it can be quickly removed if there is a joint effort and will,” Geagea reassured.
Comparing the Islamic State to the Syrian regime, the LF leader added: “Is the use of chemical weapons and the killing of thousands of people in a few minutes less horrible than the IS' practices and the murder of hundreds of people in a few hours?”
“Is slaughtering an American journalist in the presence of cameras a less terrorist act than blowing up and murdering Rafik Hariri, Bassel Fleihan, Samir Qassir, George Hawi, Gebran Tueni, Pierre Gemayel and other martyrs?” the LF leader went on to say.
Geagea noted that “eradicating the IS is an instant duty that must be accompanied by eliminating the reasons that led to the rise of the IS,” pointing out that the principles of “freedom, democracy, pluralism and civil and humanitarian culture must be spread.”
Commenting on the recent deadly clashes between the army and gunmen from the IS and al-Nusra Front in and around the Bekaa town of Arsal, Geagea saluted “the souls of the Lebanese army's martyrs, the last of whom was the martyr Ali al-Sayyed,” hailing the army's “major sacrifices.”
“We throw our support behind it as it preserves Lebanon's borders in both directions and defends national sovereignty. We also call for the immediate release of the abducted Lebanese troops,” he added.
Deadly clashes broke out between the army and militants from the IS and Nusra on August 2 after troops arrested a top jihadist leader.
The fighting ended with a ceasefire on August 7 but the militants kidnapped around 35 troops and policemen.
The IS has in recent days beheaded two captive Lebanese army troops, Ali al-Sayyed and Abbas Medlej.
Y.R.
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