Geagea: Transferring False Witnesses File to Justice Council Attempt to Limit STL's Functioning

Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea stated that the decision to "transfer what they call they 'false witnesses file' to the justice council is an attempt limit the Special Tribunal for Lebanon's functioning."

He told Nile Live Egyptian television that Hizbullah and its allies are insistent on boycotting Cabinet as long as the government does not take a certain legal measure that limits the STL's jurisdiction, adding: "The solution does not lie in surrendering to the other camp's conditions … if we surrender to Hizbullah and its allies, then we are taking Lebanon to a major disaster," he said.

He noted that President Michel Suleiman and Prime Minister Saad Hariri are overseeing Cabinet's work and they have taken a decision not to subject the false witnesses file to a vote, while Hizbullah and its allies refuse this reasoning.

"No one has the right to place conditions on the president and prime minister and impose any article on Cabinet's agenda," he continued.

Geagea summed up the Lebanese crisis by saying that a section of the Lebanese believes that the STL is an American-Israeli product aimed at destroying Hizbullah, while "our reasoning says that we have yet to receive anything from the tribunal."

"The Lebanese citizen has been taken hostage, which should not happen, and therefore, the constitutional institutions must continue their functioning regardless of our political dispute over the indictment," he stressed.

Furthermore, he announced that he would not be paying Syria a visit, noting that the tensions in Lebanon will persist over the upcoming months.