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Lebanon parliament postpones selection of next president

The Lebanese parliament speaker on Sunday postponed a session to elect a new president until next month as the head of the Arab League failed to break the presidential deadlock after crisis talks with the country's feuding factions and Syrian officials.

The postponement of a parliament session scheduled for yesterday to elect a president was the latest of more than a dozen such delays since the sharply divided legislature first tried to select a new head of state in September.

It underlined continued deep political differences between the anti-Syrian parliamentary majority and the opposition over the make up of the future government that would be formed after a new president is elected. Lebanon has been without a president since pro-Syrian Emile Lahoud's term ended on Nov. 23.

The presidential crisis has compounded a yearlong fierce power struggle between the Western-backed government of Prime Minister Fuad Siniora and the Syrian-backed opposition led by the militant Hezbollah group.

The announcement by Speaker Nabih Berri to postpone the session until Feb. 11 came shortly after Berri met Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa, who has been holding talks with rival factions since last week. Moussa has been urging an Arab plan that calls for the election of army commander, General Michel Suleiman, as president, the formation of a national unity government and the adoption of a new electoral law.

The plan was unanimously adopted by Arab foreign ministers in Cairo earlier this month.

Berri said the delay would give the two sides more time to work out their differences ahead of the presidential vote.

"The parties have begun a serious dialogue with the aim of reaching a consensus on the Arab initiative," a statement from Berri's office quoted him as saying.

On Thursday, Moussa brought together Christian opposition leader Michel Aoun and legislator Saad Hariri, leader of the anti-Syrian parliamentary majority, in the first such meeting in three months.

But no concrete results emerged from this meeting as both sides stuck to their positions.

Though both sides have backed Suleiman, they remain deadlocked over an amendment to Lebanon's constitution that would allow the head of the military to become president.

They also have not been able to agree on whether the opposition should have veto power on major issues.

Moussa has held five days of crisis talks, including a visit to neighboring Syria, but has failed so far to solve the political crisis -- Lebanon's worst since the end of the 1975 to 1990 civil war.

"Lebanese and regional difficulties" are complicating matters, Moussa told reporters Sunday -- in an apparent reference to Syria, a key player in Lebanon and the opposition's main backer. Syria has been accused by the US and the anti-Syrian coalition of blocking the presidential vote.
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