Geagea Heads to Saudi for 'Talks with Top Officials'

Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea traveled to Saudi Arabia on Monday evening on an “official visit.”

“The chief of the LF party left this evening for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia via Beirut's airport, on an official visit during which he will meet with top Saudi officials,” Geagea's press office said in a statement.

The LF leader's visit comes amid protracted vacancy at the Baabda Palace that had started on May 25, amid a boycott of electoral sessions by the MPs of Hizbullah and the Free Patriotic Movement in protest at Geagea's nomination.

The LF chief has recently insisted that he will not pull out of the race unless the other camp changes its stances, knowing that he had several times expressed his willingness to withdraw if the rival camps agree on a “consensual” candidate.

The press office did not elaborate on whether Geagea intends to meet in the kingdom with al-Mustaqbal movement leader MP Saad Hariri, who has since January 2011 lived in self-imposed exile between Jeddah and Paris over security concerns.

The two leaders have recently voiced conflicting stances regarding the issue of the parliamentary elections, with Hariri rejecting that the polls be held before the presidential vote and Geagea supporting such a move.

Y.R.