Lebanese parl't speaker urges immediate solution to volatile situation in Mount Lebanon
Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri urged an
immediate solution to the tumultuous situation in Mount Lebanon, saying that
the flare-up there should not have happened at all.
Marwan Hamadeh, a parliament member representing the
Progressive Socialist Party (PSP) and a former minister, blamed Lebanese
Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil for the volatile incidents that Mount Lebanon
witnessed yesterday, accusing him of sowing sedition and stoking tension.
On Sunday, two aides to Lebanese Minister of State
for Refugee Affairs Saleh al Gharib, a member of the Druze ethnic group, were
killed when his convoy came under fire as it passed through an area loyal to a
rival Druze faction led by Walid Jumblatt, another Druze politican, in what the
minister described as "an armed ambush and a clear assassination
attempt".
The shooting took place after supporters of the PSP
led by Jumblatt gathered to close roads and stop a visit to the area by foreign
minister Bassil, a party colleague of Gharib. It is believed that the target of
the assassination attempt was Bassil, but the attackers did not know the convoy
belonged to Gharib.
