College Station, Texas: Unable to agree on a new military promotion package, Speaker Nabih Berri’s ongoing National Dialogue talks collapsed, after participants clashed yet once again. The next invitation to gather was set for October 26, ten-days after Commando Regiment chief Brigadier-General Chamel Roukoz, a son-in-law of the Free Patriotic Movement (FPM) leader Michel Aoun, is scheduled to retire.
Deputy Ebrahim Kanaan represented Aoun on Wednesday, allegedly because the 81-year-old was not feeling well, and left the session “when the issue of the promotions settlement was raised.” According to media sources, the talks collapsed because the Future Movement chief, former Prime Minister Fouad Saniora, and Phalange Party chief Sami Gemayel, refused to budge from their earlier positions that nothing ought to be done to interfere in how the military handled promotions.
“I submitted my paper on the characteristics of the next president in a bid to reconcile viewpoints, said Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Junblatt after leaving the dialogue session, insisting that the Lebanese Parliament would not “be able to elect a president without a full package.”
Others voiced opposing viewpoints, with Tourism Minister Michel Pharaon claiming that the FPM “rejected discussing the [military] promotions settlement around the dialogue table.” Local television stations further revealed that “the cabinet would not convene anytime soon and the government’s situation remained very difficult.”
Speaker Berri repeatedly warned that the all-party talks would need universal support if Lebanon is to free itself from its current political stagnation although the FPM leadership, backed by Hezbollah, was in no hurry to fill the country’s top Christian post, left vacant since President Michel Sulaiman ended his six-year term on May 24, 2014.
For his part, Prime Minister Tammam Salam confronted existential dilemmas over the cabinet’s decision-making mechanism and the promotion of high-ranking military officers. Many hoped that backstage accords would be reached, especially over Roukoz, though cutting a last moment deal became far more difficult.
