Kanaan, Riachi Say Maarab Agreement Alive after Bassil Mourns It
Strong Lebanon bloc secretary MP Ibrahim Kanaan and caretaker Information Minister Melhem Riachi of the Lebanese Forces insisted Wednesday that the landmark Maarab Agreement is still alive, after Free Patriotic Movement chief MP Jebran Bassil hinted that the agreement is dead.
“The Christian reconciliation was not born on a certain day, it rather belongs to history and to the coming generations,” Kanaan tweeted.
“In light of its symbolism and depth, it cannot be erased by a political or governmental dispute, after we achieved an influential Christian presence in state institutions,” he added.
Riachi meanwhile told al-Jadeed television that the Maarab Agreement was “an agreement between three parties: President (Michel) Aoun, LF leader (Samir) Geagea and Christians, from the last hut in Lebanon's mountains to the last home in the diaspora.”
“These three parties are holding onto the Maarab Agreement and the reconciliation, that's why it (the agreement) has not and will not fall,” Riachi added.
Bassil had hinted Tuesday that the Maarab Agreement “no longer exists.”
The distribution of shares in the new government “should be proportional in order to form a national unity cabinet and if a party wants to voluntarily give up seats they are free to do so,” said Bassil after the weekly meeting of the Strong Lebanon bloc.
“But if there is a party that does not want to give up seats because a political agreement no longer exists, no one can force it to do so,” Bassil added.
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