Introduction to the evening news 05-03-2012

Two minorities do not make a quorum. The current majority went back to being a minority without MP Walid Jumblatt’s bloc, exactly like when the former majority turned into a minority when Mukhtara’s leader resigned.        

This is how the quorum was lost today. The Martyrs’ square twin-protests were not trouble-free; they gave Speaker Berri a new hope for a consensus expected to be reached during a new parliamentary session on the 15th of this month. However, if positions remained unchanged, as General Michel Aoun said, the awaited session may not be better than today’s session, thus keeping the billions issue unresolved.        

In Syria, new due dates are expected; in fact, on Saturday the 10th, the U.N. special envoy Kofi Annan will visit Damascus, on the eve of the first annual anniversary of the outbreak of Syrian incidents.         

Anan’s arrival in Syria coincides with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov’s meeting with the Arab foreign ministers in Cairo. But the most important Syrian-related due date will take place in Istanbul at the end of this month when the second “Friends of Syria” meeting will be held, after the first unsuccessful meeting held in Tunisia.