A session on capital control was adjourned Wednesday, as the Lebanese Forces and Free Patriotic Movement's MPs refused to discuss the draft law.

Depositors and activists had rallied since morning outside Parliament to prevent MPs from attending the session held by the joint parliamentary committees, as they considered that the law will deprive depositors from their rights.

Depositors and activists rallied Wednesday outside Parliament to prevent MPs from attending a session on capital control held by the joint parliamentary committees.

Some protestors kicked the car of Deputy Speaker Elie Ferzli and threw stones at it, media reports said.

Lebanon is close to reaching an agreement with the World Bank in which the international agency would give the crisis-hit country a $150 million loan for food security and to stabilize bread prices for the next six months, the economy minister has said.

Amin Salam said talks with the International Monetary Fund were progressing in a positive way.

The motive behind the killing of the pharmacist Layla Rizk in her drugstore in Mrouj on Monday was not theft, Interior Minister Bassam al-Mawlawi said on Tuesday.

CCTV “cameras have led to some threads,” Mawlawi added from Bkirki, noting that “the criminal will soon be brought to justice.”

The Syrian embassy in Lebanon on Tuesday denied interfering in Lebanon’s parliamentary elections, stressing its “respect for Lebanon’s sovereignty.”

“Some sides are continuing to promote claims about ‘political and security interferences by the Syrian embassy’ in the anticipated Lebanese parliamentary juncture,” the embassy said in a statement, describing the allegations as “attempts to reverse facts and fabricate enemies.”

Hizbullah took part in behind-the-scenes political contacts over the past few hours in a bid to contain the repercussions of President Michel Aoun’s remarks from Bkirki, in which he accused the Shiite Duo of obstructing the probe into the Beirut port blast, a media report said.

Aoun’s remarks came after Finance Minister Youssef Khalil, who is close to Speaker Nabih Berri, refused to sign the appointments of the heads of the Court of Cassation, which is looking into recusal lawsuits against the judge leading the investigations into the port blast case, Tarek Bitar.

The mission of Beirut port blast investigator Judge Tarek Bitar has likely been shelved indefinitely and perhaps permanently, a senior legal source said.

The mission might be resumed during the next presidential tenure, the source added, in remarks to al-Liwaa newspaper published Tuesday.

Prime Minister Najib Miqati on Tuesday reassured that authorities have no plans to “eliminate depositors’ rights or undermine the banking sector.”

“The government’s priority in its economic approach is to preserve depositors’ rights and not to waste them,” Miqati told a delegation from the Association of Banks in Lebanon.

Three people were killed and two others injured in a huge blaze Tuesday at a tubs factory in the Fanar neighborhood of Zaaitriye, the National News Agency said.

“Red Cross and Civil Defense crews are still inspecting the site in search of possible victims,” NNA added.

The pharmacist Layla Rizk has been found murdered inside her pharmacy in the Northern Metn town of Mrouj.

Conflicting reports have since emerged on whether the pharmacy was robbed or not and on whether the woman was raped or not.