French presidential envoy Jean-Francois Girault is scheduled to visit Beirut early this week in a new attempt aimed at ending the political deadlock that has left Lebanon without a president for over eight months.
However, Girault’s visit, the second to Lebanon in less than two months as part of a French initiative designed to prod rival Lebanese leaders to agree on a consensus president, comes amid bleak prospects for breaking the presidential impasse after Iran refused to respond favorably to the French efforts, diplomatic sources said.
“The French initiative, which has been put on hold for now, will remain in limbo until the fate of the ongoing behind-the-scene negotiations is known in order to find out whether they will lead to positive results,” an Arab diplomat based in a European country said, referring to Iran’s ongoing talks with Western powers over its nuclear program.
“Each of international negotiators is upholding cards of pressure which makes the French initiative, whose broad lines are articulated by Girault, useless,” he said.
Girault, head of the French Foreign Ministry’s Middle East and North Africa Department, who held talks on the presidential crisis with rival Lebanese leaders during his trip to Beirut in December, has also visited Saudi Arabia, Iran and the Vatican for the same purpose.
The Arab diplomat noted that the high-ranking foreign officials, including U.S. President Barak Obama and Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, who thronged to Saudi Arabia last week to offer condolences over the death of King Abdullah, have sent a minor signal about the openness of lines between Riyadh and Tehran that could help find a solution to the presidential crisis in Lebanon.
“The outcome of regional developments will shape the new political outlook of the region,” he said.
Despite the gloomy prospects over the presidential election, as a result of Iran’s reluctance to respond favorably to the French initiative by referring Girault to its allies in Lebanon, the diplomat disclosed that the French envoy might be carrying a new proposal to discuss with Lebanese officials that could help break the deadlock.
Girault has requested meetings with Speaker Nabih Berri, Prime Minister Tammam Salam and other leaders. They will find out from the French envoy whether he was coming here on a fact-finding visit to accompany the internal dialogues (between the Future Movement and Hezbollah and between the Free Patriotic Movement and the Lebanese Forces), or whether he will present new ideas to resolve the presidential crisis.
Ahead of Girault’s visit to Lebanon, it was reported that French diplomats held preliminary meetings with some Lebanese factions, including Hezbollah, that could help define the path of the ongoing local and regional consultations over the presidential election.
However, a Lebanese source in contact with Girault told The Daily Star that the French envoy’s new visit does not entail more than France’s insistence on proceeding with its initiative over Lebanon’s presidential election and sounding out the views of Lebanese leaders in light of the ongoing dialogue among rival factions.
France wants to keep the presidential election issue on the go, while waiting for local and regional conditions to be ripe for the election of a consensus president, the source said.
Despite Girault’s upcoming visit to Beirut, the attention of the Lebanese, who have become accustomed to the presidential vacuum, is currently focused on other issues, mainly the deteriorating security situation in the country, on Lebanon’s northern and eastern border with Syria, and the southern border with Israel, the source added.
Although Girault’s visit is a follow-up to previous trips he made to Lebanon and other countries in the region, the source said the envoy has reached the conviction that none of the countries concerned with the Lebanese presidential crisis is ready to facilitate the French initiative. France is facing successive frustrations in its foreign policy, primarily in the Middle East.
Should Iran decide to cooperate over the presidential issue, it prefers to deal directly with the United States, the main player, the source said.
He added that the U.S. and Saudi Arabia were willing to see the presidential election take place before a nuclear agreement is signed between Iran and Western powers. The Vatican also encourages this approach, but it does not seem that solutions for the presidential crisis have been put on the right track.
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