News Introduction for Saturday 26-11-2011

Between Rabieh’s meeting today and Tripoli’s rally tomorrow the country is torn apart. Internal as well as external oppositions and pressures surround Mikati’s government, and its fate will be decided on Wednesday during the cabinet meeting where the funding of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon will be discussed.

Until now, the Change and Reform parliamentary bloc did not take any decision to resign from the government but linked the resignation of its ministers to five critical headlines. Will they resign from the government or just boycott any upcoming cabinet meeting? Would Hezbollah benefit from this boycott to postpone cabinet meetings and avoid discussing the funding of the STL thus lengthening the life of Mikati’s government?

Will Mikati surrender to the pressure or will he hit with a strong comeback and change all equations? All these questions are pending for now until Mikati’s return from Rome where he will be meeting with Pope Benedict XVI.

On the Syrian scene, the scenario is revealed; the Arab Finance ministers are studying a fresh economic round of sanctions on the Syrian Regime amid a Lebanese opposition and Iraqi-Jordanian reservations. The Foreign ministers will meet on Sunday to impose these sanctions.

On the other hand, the Syrian Arab News Agency broadcast tonight the letter sent by Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem to the Secretary-General of the Arab League Nabil Elaraby regarding Syria’s pending response on the Arab Protocol discussing the deployments of Arab monitors as well as the decisions of the Arab Ministerial Council. Muallem said that the council drifted from the Arab plan, and all its decisions are seen as a direct intervention in the Syrian internal affairs and a clear breach of Article 8 of the Charter of the Arab League.

Muallem considered that all voices calling on the General-Secretary of the United Nations to take actions against Syria according to the UN Charter are inciting direct military intervention in the country by all foreign powers. Surprisingly, the United Nations announced that there was no need for humanitarian corridors in Syria, indirectly rejecting the requests of French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe.

In Morocco the Party of Justice and Islamic Development won-out in the legislative elections after the Islamist managed to obtain the largest number of seats in parliament.