Top Officials Represent Lebanon at Inauguration of Suez Canal Extension

Speaker Nabih Berri, Prime Minister Tammam Salam and Deputy PM Defense Minister Samir Moqbel attend Thursday the inauguration of a major extension of the Suez Canal in Egypt.

The three officials are expected to return to Beirut the same day.

The event in the port city of Ismailiya, which was attended by several heads of state including French President Francois Hollande, comes two years after then army chief Abdel Fattah Sisi overthrew his Islamist predecessor.

Sisi broke ground on the project last August after being elected president on promises of strengthening security and reviving a dilapidated economy.

The $8.5 billion extension of the waterway is funded entirely by Egyptians, without foreign aid.

The new extension involved digging and dredging along 72 kilometers of the 193-kilometer canal, making a parallel waterway at its middle that will facilitate two-way traffic accommodating the world's largest ships.

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