Cyprus president becomes first foreign dignitary to meet with Aoun

Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides has become the foreign head of state and first foreign dignitary to pay an official visit to Lebanon's new President Joseph Aoun.

Aoun, the former commander of the Lebanese army, was elected Thursday by the Lebanese parliament to fill a more than two-year vacuum in the presidency.

The two leaders met at the presidential palace in Baabda, southeast of Beirut.

“I wanted to be the first to visit President Aoun and show, not in words but in actions that Cyprus stands by Lebanon and the Lebanese people,” Christodoulides told reporters afterward.

Cyprus and Lebanon have had close relations for decades. Cyprus is less than 200 kilometers (130 miles) from the Lebanese capital Beirut and has provided the country with military assistance to prop up its armed forces. The island became a refuge for thousands of Lebanese during Lebanon’s 1975-90 civil war. Many more Lebanese citizens moved there following the historic economic meltdown in Lebanon that started in late 2019.

In recent years the two countries have also been involved in intense discussions over border control, as many Syrian refugees living in Lebanon -- and an increasing number of Lebanese after the country fell into a major economic crisis beginning in 2019 -- sought to reach Cyprus by sea in smuggler boats.