BEIRUT: France will resume its efforts to push for the election of a Lebanese president after the New Year with Saudi Arabia and Iran, the two regional heavyweights who command a great influence on Lebanese rival parties, according media reports.
Pan-Arab, Saudi-owned daily Asharq al-Awsat reported Wednesday that Jean-Francois Girault, chief of the French Foreign Ministry’s Middle East and North Africa Department, would visit Riyadh and Tehran, in addition to the Vatican, starting Jan. 5, in an attempt to help break the deadlock that has left Lebanon without a head of state for more than six months.
The paper quoted French Foreign Ministry sources as saying that “there is an opportunity to break the presidential impasse, with Tehran showing more flexibility in that regard as well as on the Syrian crisis, by accepting Russia’s proposal to push for a Syria dialogue.”
The paper said that the Vatican was unhappy with Lebanon’s Maronite leaders, whom it blamed for the vacancy in the country’s top post, which is reserved for Maronite Christians under Lebanon's National Pact.
The Lebanese president is the only Christian head of state in the Arab world and The Holy See was “considering” a new initiative aimed at ending the presidential stalemate, the paper said, quoting Arab diplomatic sources.
Girault visited Lebanon earlier this month on what was described as an exploratory mission to sound out Lebanese politicians and push for the election of a consensus president.
The top post is mainly contested by rivals Michel Aoun, head of the Free Patriotic Movement, and Samir Geagea, chief of the Lebanese Forces, who belong to opposite coalitions, March 8 and March 14 respectively.
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