Wikileaks on Bassil: The agreement with Hezbollah is a conspiracy

The American Embassy to Lebanon issued a Wikileaks cable 352, saying that the Minister of Energy Gebran Bassil described the agreement between Hezbollah and the Free Patriotic Movement (FPM) as being the biggest conspiracy, pointing that it was necessary as Lebanon was going through tough political tensions.   

According to Al-Mustaqbal newspaper Bassil said that “Some people in the FPM were impressed by Hezbollah’s political power and they were looking for a political umbrella to protect minorities and Shiites were able to provide this protection”

On February 7, 2006 Bassil met with a political consultant in the embassy and told him that the 10th item in the FPM-Hezbollah agreement is the most thorny, adding that the expression “To protect Lebanon from Israeli threats” should be discussed with the rest of political parties.

The cable quoted Bassil as saying “We should start looking into pending issues since the Lebanese civil war 1975-1990 especially that the General Secretary of Hezbollah Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah promised us to deal with the question of the Southern Lebanese Army whose members are hiding in Israel since the liberation in 2000 and should be returned to their families”.