The following are summaries of today's major stories published in the Arabic press. LBCI does not edit press digest articles for content, giving English-language readers insight into the various views expressed in newspapers across the Arab world.
Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati will head to the northern city of Tripoli today to chair a meeting aiming at evaluating the security plan implemented in the city and discussing the latest events and developments. Caretaker Interior Minister Marawn Charbel, security apparatuses’ leaders and judges from the city will take part in the meeting.
In this context, sources told
al-Joumhouria Daily that the meeting will be held at Mikati’s residence, who decided to head to the city to put an end to the attacks targeting the Alawite citizens.
Al-Joumhouria Newspaper reported that a meeting will take place soon between the National Struggle Front and the
Change and Reform bloc at the Parliament, within the series of meetings that the latter is seeking to hold with all the parliamentary blocs.
The expected meeting with the NSF will be the fourth, following the meetings held with the Development and Liberation bloc, Future bloc and the Kataeb parliamentary bloc.
Speaker Nabih Berri stressed that he did not go to Tehran through mediation, but in order to encourage openness and convergence between Iran and its Arab neighboring countries, noting that the Iranian leadership was very responsive in this regard.
However, Berri pointed out that Iran will not take part in Geneva II peace conference over Syria, in case pre-conditions to its participation were placed.
In a statement to
al-Joumhouria Daily, Berri said that Iran sees that the only solution to the Syrian crisis will be through Geneva II, stressing the need to reach common grounds between Iran and Saudi Arabia in order to resolve Lebanon’s governmental issue and other regional conflicts.
In this context, he stressed the need to form a new cabinet, denouncing March 14 forces' continuous objection to the 9-9-6 formula.
On another note, the speaker told the same daily that he will not tackle the issue of the presidency, whether it was regarding the candidates or the voting, before the 25th of March 2014, which is the constitutional date to start the presidential elections.
This as he stated that he supports holding a cabinet session to discuss the oil file, "since it is an urgent matter that must be finalized in order to protect Lebanon’s rights in the economic zone."
Security sources stressed that the investigations conducted in the case of the twin blasts that targeted the Iranian Embassy in the Beirut region of Bir Hassan are witnessing remarkable progress, stressing "that the security apparatuses are dealing with a professional group that implemented a well-planned operation."
However, the sources denied, in a statement to
as-Safir Newspaper, reports stating that a number of suspects were arrested, adding that the investigations are still ongoing in order to detect the track followed by the booby-trapped cars before reaching the Bir Hassan region.
In this regard, the daily reported that a security apparatus has received the footage of the surveillance cameras from the crime scene, pointing out that technical procedures will follow in order to analyze the cameras’ contents.