Geagea: Lebanese Army Better Equipped and Trained than Hizbullah

Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea criticized on Thursday Hizbullah’s possession of arms, saying that if this issue is not resolved, then any side attempting to constructive governmental functioning will fail.

He told France 24 and Radio Monte Carlo: “Its arms can be used to obstruct the democratic process in Lebanon or take it off its course, similar to what happened a month an a half ago.”

“As the March 14 camp, we were part of the government and we had a prime minister, but given the weapons, what did we achieve? Nothing, because you can’t have legal legitimacy, while the actual authority lies elsewhere,” he noted.

“The president and prime minister-designate are authorized to form the new government as stipulated by the constitution and FPM leader MP Michel Aoun’s statements over amending the constitution to grant the president a stake in Cabinet is nonsense,” he continued.

Geagea added: “Our opposition to Miqati’s formation of a one-sided government stems from our belief that a Cabinet that reflects the current situation in the country will be unable to achieve any progress.”

He added that the national dialogue attempted for four years to tackle Hizbullah’s arms and “all participants at the talks proposed solutions except the party, which considers itself not be concerned with the affair.”

Hizbullah rejected proposals over its weapons “meaning that it will be able to use them whenever it wants and wherever it wants.”

Geagea stated that the March 14 camp will not return to the dialogue table without tackling the party’s arms.

Addressing the March 14 forces’ refusal to take part in the new government, he said that the boycott “goes beyond participation, but it is connected to the general situation in Lebanon” starting with Hizbullah’s possession of arms.

Any resistance movement should enjoy national consensus, but this is not the case in Lebanon “as half of the Lebanese oppose its arms and the greatest evidence of this are the 2009 parliamentary elections,” he added.

“As opposed to the impression Hizbullah is trying to portray, the Lebanese army is better equipped and trained than the party as we have gained this experience by observing Hizbullah’s conduct between 1990 and 2000,” he stressed.