Saudi Ambassador to Lebanon Walid Bukhari on Wednesday held talks in Ain el-Tineh with Speaker Nabih Berri.

“The Saudi stance emphasizes the need to speed up the election of a president for the Lebanese republic who would be able to achieve the aspirations of the brotherly Lebanese people,” Bukhari said after the meeting.

The Constitutional Council has issued a ruling suspending the implementation of the law that extended municipalities’ term, media reports said.

The Council will “study the filed appeals and issue its final ruling in the coming weeks, knowing that the term of municipalities will expire at the end of May,” MTV reported.

Kataeb leader Sami Gemayel said Wednesday that he can't head into "the abyss" of six more years of humiliation by electing a president who won't make a change.

"We are open to any solution," Gemayel stressed, after he met with Deputy Speaker Elias Bou Saab, part of an "exploratory tour" the latter had started to discuss the presidential and political crisis with Lebanese leaders.

Protesting taxi drivers on Tuesday blocked several vital roads and highways across the country to voice a host of demands.

The drivers blocked the Saifi road, the Beirut-Karantina highway, the Jounieh highway and the main Hamra street following a sit-in at the Riad al-Solh Square.

The 2023 Canada-United Kingdom Media Freedom Award was presented Tuesday to independent Egyptian online newspaper Mada Masr for its “extraordinary commitment to high-quality independent journalism,” the UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office said.

“The newspaper continued to report, amidst a takedown of their website and legal threats to its reporters. This award signals Canada and the UK’s enduring commitment to supporting free and independent journalism,” the FCDO said in a statement.

The Administration and Justice Committee studied Tuesday a law aiming at regulating the status of Syrian refugees in Lebanon and decided to adjourn the discussion until next week.

The Committee's head, Lebanese Forces MP Georges Adwan, said that he will not accept the integration of the refugees and urged Arab states not to return Syria to the Arab fold before the repatriation of the refugees.

Deputy Speaker Elias Bou Saab met Tuesday with Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi in Bkerki, as he starts an "exploratory tour" to discuss the presidential crisis with Lebanese leaders.

"Our real problem is not the name of the president but that parties are not willing to communicate," Bou Saab answered a reporter in a press conference after the meeting, after he had said that he did not discuss with al-Rahi any names.

Free Patriotic Movement chief Jebran Bassil on Sunday urged a Christian agreement on a new president.

Deputy Speaker Elias Bou Saab on Friday held a meeting with MP Mohammed Raad -- the head of Hezbollah’s Loyalty to Resistance parliamentary bloc.

“The meeting was necessary and important and aimed to evaluate the stage that we are going through and to seek to find exits and common denominators among the parliamentary blocs,” Bou Saab said after the talks.

Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri said he is not expecting the worst, and that his words were misinterpreted when he said he only sees negativity.

"I am neither pessimistic nor optimistic," Berri told al-Liwaa, in remarks published Friday. He added that the foreign indications are positive concerning the election of Marada leader Suleiman Franjieh.