Hizbullah Bloc Urges Return to Dialogue, Respecting 'Real Partnership'

Hizbullah's Loyalty to Resistance parliamentary bloc on Thursday urged the resumption of national dialogue sessions, describing the all-party talks as the only “realistic” solution.

“National dialogue is in the interest of Lebanon and all its components,” said the bloc in a statement issued after its weekly meeting.

“National dialogue is the available realistic solution for Lebanon and the bloc urges everyone to return to dialogue because its absence would further complicate the country's crisis,” it added.

Clarifying Hizbullah's boycott of the cabinet session that was held earlier in the day, which was also boycotted by the ministers of the Free Patriotic Movement, Marada Movement and Tashnag Party, the bloc said: “To avoid any repercussions from the ongoing disputes and to allow further deliberations, the bloc demanded the postponement of today's cabinet session.”

“The needed solution requires respecting real partnership and national balance,” Loyalty to Resistance added.

It also slammed what it called “the Saudi regime's destructive role in Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, Iraq and Bahrain.”

The FPM has suspended its participation in cabinet sessions and national dialogue meetings over accusations that other parties in the country are not respecting the 1943 National Pact.

The National Pact is an unwritten agreement that set the foundations of modern Lebanon as a multi-confessional state based on Christian-Muslim partnership.

The FPM's latest boycott of cabinet meetings was initially linked to the thorny issue of military and security appointments. The movement has long voiced reservations over the government's decision-taking mechanism in the absence of a president.

The defense minister had recently postponed the retirement of Higher Defense Council chief Maj. Gen. Mohammed Kheir after no consensus was reached over three candidates that he had proposed, angering the FPM which says that it opposes term extensions for all senior officers.

Addressing Prime Minister Tammam Salam on Friday, FPM chief Jebran Bassil said “the son of late PM Saeb Salam must pay great attention when he says that the government is respecting the National Pact when it convenes in the presence of ministers representing only six percent of a main component of the country (Christians).”

Bassil has also warned that the country might be soon plunged into a “political system crisis” if the other parties do not heed the FPM's demands regarding Muslim-Christian “partnership.”

Marada Movement chief MP Suleiman Franjieh hit back at Bassil on Monday, saying Marada and the other Christian parties in the cabinet “represent a lot more than six percent.”