Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea expressed regret on Wednesday that the state is decaying over the failure to elect a new head of state and expressed optimism on reaching an agreement with his rivals in the Free Patriotic Movement.

“In the absence of a president, the state is eroding bit by bit,” said Geagea during a press conference he held at his residence in Maarab, the same day MPs failed again to elect a new president.

Speaker Nabih Berri downplayed the controversy on the latest speeches made by al-Mustaqbal movement leader ex-PM Saad Hariri and Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, saying the two parties will continue to engage in dialogue to take important decisions.

“We are done with the speeches of platforms and we will head to the dialogue aimed at taking decisions and implementing them,” Berri said in remarks published in several local dailies on Wednesday.

Russian Ambassador to Lebanon Alexander Zasypkin praised dialogue among the Lebanese parties, considering it a necessity to combat the challenges and risks that the country is passing through.

“Foreign countries support the dialogue, in particular because it is touching on local and regional issues, in the first place the battle against terrorism and extremism,” Zasypkin said in an interview with An Nahar newspaper on Tuesday.

Speaker Nabih Berri expected the dialogue between Hizbullah and al-Mustaqbal to salvage Lebanon in the absence of a head of state despite his concern that the presidential deadlock needs a solution from abroad.

“The dialogue salvages (the country) from vacuum amid the lack of signs that it would end soon,” Berri's visitors quoted him as saying.

Al-Mustaqbal Movement leader and ex-Prime Minister Saad Hariri stressed the importance of dialogue and moderation to combat the terrorism of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), local newspapers reported on Tuesday.

Hariri's statement came during a meeting for the leaders and members of al-Mustaqbal movement at the Center House in downtown Beirut on Monday night.

Prime Minister Tammam Salam held talks on Saturday with Speaker Nabih Berri in Ain el-Tineh to discuss the mechanism of the cabinet and the opening of an extraordinary session for parliament.

The meeting focused on the controversial crises that the state has been passing through after the term of President Michel Suleiman ended in May.

Speaker Nabih Berri expressed dissatisfaction with the cabinet's status quo, considering the government as eroding from the inside due to the “reckless use” of the jurisdictions by ministers.

“The cabinet is meeting but the ministers aim at infuriating each others by rejecting decrees related to certain ministries,” Berri said in comments published in al-Akhbar newspaper on Saturday.

A much-anticipated security plan for the Bekaa Valley kicked off at dawn Thursday, resulting in the arrest of 10 fugitives and the confiscation of 18 stolen cars.

Media reports said a joint force from the Internal Security Forces' special panthers unit and the Lebanese army cordoned off the towns of Hawr Taala and Brital at 4:00 am.

Speaker Nabih Berri has said that he would hold talks with Prime Minister Tammam Salam soon to discuss the decision-making mechanism adopted by the government to function in the absence of a president.

Berri told his visitors that the opening of an extraordinary session would also be on the agenda of their talks.

Maronite Bishop Boulos Mattar stressed on Monday that linking the presidential election with the conflict in the region is a great mistake, hailing the dialogue between the political arch-foes.

“If Lebanon was a leading country in making culture... then how could it link its fate to that of other countries in the Middle East?” Mattar wondered in his sermon on the occasion of St. Maroun Day.