Speaker Nabih Berri has said that authorities would take the appropriate action when the time to pay Lebanon’s share of funds to the Special Tribunal for Lebanon comes.

Berri’s visitors told al-Joumhouria daily published Monday that the deadline for Lebanon’s payment of its share is not at the end of September as some expected.

Speaker Nabih Berri on Friday lashed out at a speech given by Israeli Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the United Nations General Assembly, Saying it was filled with “contempt” and “grudge.”

“Hizbullah doesn’t preside over the U.N. Security Council nor do President Michel Suleiman and Prime Minister (Najib Miqati), but Lebanon does the state that was slaughtered (by Israel) in 1996,” Berri said in a statement.

Speaker Nabih Berri praised the Lebanese officials’ cooperation in approving the electricity project, An Nahar newspaper reported on Friday.

“The Lebanese won… Political disputes and discussions are normal, but when it comes to the people’s livelihoods and economic status, everyone should compromise,” Berri said.

Parliament endorsed on Thursday an electricity draft law that was approved a day earlier by the joint parliamentary committees based on a proposal made by Speaker Nabih Berri and rejected by MP Michel Aoun’s Change and Reform bloc.

Aoun expressed reservations on the bill during the session. He had met with Berri ahead of the legislature’s meeting.

A tense atmosphere from a meeting of joint parliamentary committees on the electricity project spilled into the cabinet on Wednesday amid reported verbal clashes between Change and Reform bloc ministers on one side and Health Minister Ali Hasan Khalil.

Media reports said that during a government session held at the Grand Serail an argument erupted between Labor Minister Charbel Nahhas and Khalil, who is Speaker Nabih Berri’s aide, after the Change and Reform bloc minister described a decision reached at the committees meeting as “dissent.”

Speaker Nabih Berri stressed that he will not back down on the consensus reached over the electricity bill that he suggested during Wednesday’s joint parliamentary committees meeting.

“The electricity plan will be subjected to vote during today’s (Thursday’s) parliamentary session,” Berri told As Safir newspaper on Thursday.

MP Robert Ghanem announced on Wednesday that an agreement was reached to adopt the government’s version of the electricity draft law.

He said after a meeting for the parliamentary joint committees that the law will be referred to parliament where it will be subject to a vote on Thursday.

Speaker Nabih Berri welcomed Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi’s scheduled visit to the southern border towns in the upcoming days, An Nahar newspaper reported on Wednesday.

“These kind of rare visitors don’t need an invitation, he (Patriarch al-Rahi) will be among his pastors and family,” Berri told the daily.

Speaker Nabih Berri said on Wednesday that some officials are carrying out aggravating actions against each other instead of bearing in mind the people’s interests.

“I call on all the political powers, March 8 forces and March 14-led opposition, to work on providing the Lebanese people with their livelihood demands,” Berri told An Nahar newspaper.

Speaker Nabih Berri called parliament to session on Thursday in order for it to address various pending issues, including the electricity file.

He also called on the joint parliamentary committees to convene on Wednesday in order to tackle the electricity draft law.