Syrian diplomatic sources in Kuwait told Al-Raii daily about a meeting held between Syrian president Bashar Assad and members of the Syrian diaspora living in Kuwait on the 29th of August.
A diaspora member told the newspaper that Assad answered many questions on ongoing issues in Syria and the Middle East.
Asked about the disagreement with Qatar Assad said “there are many reasons for this disagreement, but it all happened when the Turkish PM Erdogan called me in January to inform that he was coming along with Qatari PM Hamad Bin Jassim to hold a tripartite meeting in Syria and that they will both arrive to Damascus International Airport in a couple of hours”.
Assad added that he asked from both PMs to postpone the meeting to allow more preparations but Erdogan refused as he already left Turkey and was on board. “They both came to Syria to discuss mainly the current events in Lebanon, they wanted to keep former PM Saad el Hariri in power and they needed my support”, Assad was quoted as saying.
“I was surprised with their requests and I tried to explain to them some of the hidden clues in Lebanese politics especially about the transitional governmental period which Lebanon is going through”.
“I told them that I had no personal problems with Hariri and I reject him being in power again because of negative feedbacks that a high Saudi Arabian official said about him being incompetent and unable to handle a PM position especially in this situation; Bin Jassim was dissatisfied with my stances and they both left Syria unhappy”.
Al-Raii quoted diaspora members as saying “President Assad told us that the second reason was Syria’s objection to support the Libyan so called revolution thing that disturbed Qatari PM as Qatar showed unexplained support to NATO intervention and Libyan armed groups”.
Speaker Nabih Berri said that electricity plan’s agreement was for all Lebanese without any distinction since the current cabinet looks forward to meet peoples’ demand far from unimportant political equations.
An-Nahar newspaper quoted Berri as saying “the electricity law is behind us and we should be prepared now to the upcoming oil project and I call on all politicians to be responsible in order to preserve this national treasure”
Sources close to head
of the Future Movement bloc Fouad Seniora said that, March 14 forces have proven,
after the agreement on the electricity project, that it can exercise an
objective opposition and prevent uncontrolled spending even under political
hype and media pressures.
The sources told
An-Nahar that the observations made by the Future bloc allowed PM Najib Mikati
and Speaker Nabih Berri to reach an agreement and pass the electricity
law.
Wikileaks recently
released a cable issued by the United States Embassy in Lebanon saying that the
Minister of Energy Gebran Bassil described the agreement between Hezbollah and
the Free Patriotic Movement (FPM) as being “the biggest conspiracy”, but pointing
out 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 the fact that the general secretary
of Hezbollah, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, promised us to deal with the question of
the Southern Lebanese Army whose members have been hiding in Israel since the
liberation in 2000 and should be returned to their families”.
Sources close to
PM Najib Mikati expressed his relief after the agreement on the electricity
plan in the parliament.
The sources added
that the government worked on the proposal with Mikati following the legal,
administrative, technical and financial details of the plan to ensure its
success.
The sources told
An-Nahar newspaper about the importance of the collaboration between the
cabinet and the parliament as well as between all Lebanese political parties
amid the ongoing situation on the region.