Beirut port blast investigator Judge Tarek Bitar on Monday postponed all interrogation sessions scheduled for this month in light of the “developing circumstances related to decisions issued by the state prosecutor” and to “preserve the integrity and proper conduct of the investigation.”

A session for the interrogation of ex-ministers Ghazi Zoaiter and Nouhad al-Mashnouq had been scheduled for today, Monday.

Lebanon has been ranked third in food price inflation, according to a study by the World Bank.

Domestic food price inflation remains high around the world. The countries affected most are in Africa, North America, Latin America, South Asia, Europe, and Central Asia, the World Bank said in a statement.

The caretaker cabinet convened Monday for the third time as Lebanon entered a fourth month of presidential vacuum.

The session, boycotted by the Free Patriotic Movement ministers, will discuss aid to the education and health sectors, dubbed as "urgent" by caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati.

Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati asked Monday caretaker ministers Nasser Yassin and Ali Hamieh to contact the Turkish and Syrian authorities in order to provide emergency aid after the powerful 7.8 magnitude earthquake that rocked southeastern Turkey and northern Syria early Monday.

Mikati said, before a cabinet session, that Lebanon might send a rescue force from the army and the civil defense to Turkey to provide emergency relief to the populations on the ground.

The most powerful earthquake in nearly a century struck Turkey and Syria early Monday, killing over 1,200 people in their sleep, leveling buildings and causing tremors felt as far away as Iraq.

The 7.8-magnitude quake wiped out entire sections of major Turkish cities in a restless region filled with millions of people who have fled the civil war in Syria and other conflicts.

Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi on Sunday accused the country’s lawmakers of “high treason” for failing to elect a new president.

Security forces have arrested a number of notorious money changers who are accused of currency speculation operations in a wave of raids across Lebanon.

The head of Hezbollah’s parliamentary bloc, MP Mohammed Raad, on Saturday warned that his party’s “enemies” are “trying to turn the presidential juncture in Lebanon into a platform for taking hold of a president who would implement their policies and continue their scheme of tightening the noose on the Resistance.”

Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea on Saturday stressed “the need for everyone to commit to finalizing the presidential juncture, instead of obstructing it with the aim of imposing a candidate wanted by the obstructing party.”

Most wealthy Gulf Arab nations followed Saudi Arabia's lead in recent years and ostracized crisis-hit Lebanon because of the growing influence of the Iranian-backed Hezbollah. The exception was Qatar.

Doha has been silently expanding its influence in Lebanon. It continued receiving Lebanese leaders and pumped tens millions of dollars into helping the country's armed forces amid a historic economic meltdown.