President Michel Aoun on Thursday reassured an Army Command delegation that “no one's rights will be usurped,” in connection with a growing row with Speaker Nabih Berri over a decree granting one-year seniority to a number of officers.

“You remained loyal to your oath and you did not have any shortcomings in any mission... Forget about the political statements you are hearing,” Aoun told the delegation during a meeting at the Baabda Palace.

President Michel Aoun will not back down from a controversial decree that has triggered a political confrontation between him and Speaker Nabih Berri, according to Free Patriotic Movement sources.

“The decree has been issued and it cannot be reversed, unless the Shura Council annuls it following an appeal from one of the objecting officers,” the sources told al-Akhbar daily in remarks published Thursday.

Speaker Nabih Berri has told a number of lawmakers that he still has a lot of cards to play in the growing spat between him and President Michel Aoun, a media report said.

“Berri stressed yesterday that he has a lot of cards up his sleeve which he wants to keep secret for the time being,” al-Akhbar newspaper reported on Thursday.

The growing spat between President Michel Aoun and Speaker Nabih Berri could lead to a boycott of Cabinet sessions by the ministers of Berri's AMAL Movement, a media report said.

“A number of political forces fear that the crisis could reflect negatively on the Cabinet and could even lead to the suspension of its sessions,” al-Akhbar newspaper quoted political sources as saying in remarks published Thursday.

Finance Minister Ali Hassan Khalil refused Wednesday to sign decrees for the promotion of some army officers, following a war of words between President Michel Aoun and Speaker Nabih Berri over a previous decree that granted one-year seniority to some officers.

The new decrees involve the promotion of a number of officers from the rank of colonel to the rank of brigadier general and others from lieutenant colonel to colonel.

Prime Minister Saad Hariri on Wednesday described his November resignation ordeal as “one of the bitterest crises” in his political life, while stressing that dialogue is the only possible approach in Lebanon.

“Four years have passed since the martyrdom of the brother and the comrade of the difficult days, (slain ex-minister Mohammed Shatah), and each year I was sensing the extent of the emptiness he has left. But this year I increasingly felt his absence and how much I needed his wit, wisdom and firmness during one of the bitterest crises in my political life,” said Hariri at a rally marking Shatah's fourth assassination anniversary.

Speaker Nabih Berri is “still clinging to his constitutional and legal viewpoint regarding the officers decree and whoever tries to depict the issue as being targeted against Christians would be mistaken,” MP Ali Bazzi of Berri's Development and Liberation bloc said.

“Speaker Berri does not approach things in this manner and maybe if his opinion had been taken into consideration there would have been more than one solution,” Bazzi told reporters after the Speaker's weekly meeting with lawmakers in Ain el-Tineh.

Grand Mufti of the Republic Sheikh Abdul Latif Deryan praised Saudi Arabia saying the “Kingdom is the cornerstone of Islam,” the State-run National News Agency reported on Wednesday.

“SA has always been keen on serving the Two Holy Mosques. SA is keen on the present and future of Islam away from extremism and tension,” said Deryan.

Saudi Arabia has accepted accreditation of Fawzi Kabbara as the new Lebanese Ambassador to Saudi Arabia, said pan-Arab al-Hayat daily Wednesday, after months of delay over what was perceived as a diplomatic tussle between the two countries.

The daily quoted unnamed sources at the Lebanese Foreign Ministry who said they “received a letter from the Saudi Foreign Ministry accrediting ambassador Fawzi Kabbara as Lebanon's ambassador to Riyadh.”

An aggravating political spat between President Michel Aoun and Speaker Nabih Berri over a controversial officers' decree "threatens political consensus" with an open crisis expected to weigh on all other political files, al-Joumhouria daily reported on Wednesday.