Minister of State Panos Manjian has confirmed that the cabinet will convene in Baabda Palace next Wednesday to discuss the extra-budgetary spending and 35 other articles on its agenda.

In remarks to Voice of Lebanon radio station (93.3), Manjian said the agenda that was distributed to the cabinet ministers on Friday night includes 36 articles led by the spending issue.

A March 8 coalition leader has recently told U.N. Special Coordinator for Lebanon Derek Plumbly that the world body should help Lebanon in the investigation of an arms ship intercepted by the Lebanese army to save its reputation, As Safir daily reported on Saturday.

The newspaper said the March 8 leader asked Plumbly how the ship was able to enter Lebanon’s territorial waters despite all the measures taken by UNIFIL’s naval unit.

Free Patriotic Movement leader Michel Aoun is expected on Saturday to snap back at President Michel Suleiman, Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblat and al-Mustaqbal movement at a rally that would set the stage for future campaigns by his party ahead of the 2013 parliamentary polls.

The FPM is organizing the rally at the Platea theater in Sahel Alma in Kesrouan district on the seventh anniversary of Aoun’s return from exile to Paris.

Speaker Nabih Berri has found no reason in postponing Thursday’s cabinet session and reiterated that he would hold the government accountable if it continues to procrastinate on decisions linked to oil exploration.

There was no justification in postponing the session “amid the circumstances and the strikes carried out by more than one sector,” An Nahar daily on Saturday quoted Berri as saying.

Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat has announced that he does not intend to rejoin the March 14 camp, slamming the Free Patriotic Movement as an “irrational” political movement that is “paralyzing everything.”

Commenting on his recent trip to Saudi Arabia in an interview to be published on Saturday, Jumblat hoped to restore his previous relation with the kingdom, saying Riyadh was dismayed by his support in 2011 for the nomination of Prime Minister Najib Miqati for premiership following the collapse of Saad Hariri’s government.

Prime Minister Najib Miqati postponed Thursday’s cabinet session at Baabda Palace to avoid a showdown between the bickering parties over the $5.9 billion extra-budgetary spending of 2011, sources said.

The sources told An Nahar daily published Friday that Miqati’s decision came against the backdrop of disputes between Hizbullah, Amal and the Free Patriotic Movement on one side and the centrists on the other on how to legalize the spending.

Iranian Vice President Mohammed Reza Rahimi voiced on Thursday his country’s readiness to establish cooperation agreements between the Islamic republic and Lebanon.

He said after holding talks with President Michel Suleiman: “Iran is completely committed to supporting Lebanon.”

A cabinet session that was scheduled to be held at Baabda Palace on Thursday was postponed despite Deputy Prime Minister Samir Moqbel’s pledges to hold the meeting to settle controversial issues.

“It is necessary to hold it to settle several important issues,” Moqbel told Voice of Lebanon radio (100.5) ahead of the postponement announcement.

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Jeffrey Feltman held talks with President Michel Suleiman at the Baabda Palace on Thursday.

The U.S. official stressed the United States’ support for Lebanon’s independence, sovereignty, and stability.

The Photojournalist Syndicate announced on Wednesday that one of their colleagues, Mohammed Aazair, was assaulted on Tuesday by one of the U.S. Embassy guards.

It said in a statement that the assault took place while U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Jeffrey Feltman was visiting Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat at his Clemenceau residence in Beirut.