Saudi Ambassador to Lebanon Walid Bukhari on Wednesday held talks in Ain el-Tineh with Speaker Nabih Berri.

“The Saudi stance emphasizes the need to speed up the election of a president for the Lebanese republic who would be able to achieve the aspirations of the brotherly Lebanese people,” Bukhari said after the meeting.

Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri doesn't have a plan B and his only plan is supporting Marada leader Suleiman Franjieh for presidency, he told al-Joumhouria in remarks published Wednesday.

Berri had said last week that foreign indications are positive concerning the election of Franjieh, a statement that Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea rejected.

The Constitutional Council has issued a ruling suspending the implementation of the law that extended municipalities’ term, media reports said.

The Council will “study the filed appeals and issue its final ruling in the coming weeks, knowing that the term of municipalities will expire at the end of May,” MTV reported.

Kataeb leader Sami Gemayel said Wednesday that he can't head into "the abyss" of six more years of humiliation by electing a president who won't make a change.

"We are open to any solution," Gemayel stressed, after he met with Deputy Speaker Elias Bou Saab, part of an "exploratory tour" the latter had started to discuss the presidential and political crisis with Lebanese leaders.

"My mum doesn't agree with what I do here: at home, we don't eat like this," laughs Alan Geaam, the first Lebanese chef to earn a Michelin star in Paris.

The self-taught chef believes that promoting Lebanon's culinary riches means combining them with some of "the elegance and refinement" of French cuisine.

French firm TotalEnergies has signed a contract to begin drilling and exploring for gas this year in waters off crisis-hit Lebanon, the company said in a statement.

"TotalEnergies in agreement with its partners Eni and QatarEnergy has signed a firm contract with Transocean to hire the drilling rig that will drill an exploration well on Block 9 offshore Lebanon, as soon as possible in 2023," the group said.

Lebanese officials are cracking down on Syrian refugees against the backdrop of a worsening economic crisis and political stalemate, an escalation that has caused a panic among Syrians in the country.

In recent weeks, the army has raided refugee camps and set up checkpoints to review the documentation of non-Lebanese citizens, arresting and in many cases deporting Syrians found not to have legal residency, according to refugees and humanitarian organizations.

In Lebanon's impoverished Palestinian refugee camps, young people say they dream of leaving a struggling country where their families took refuge generations ago and where their futures remain bleak.

Nirmeen Hazineh is a descendant of survivors of what Palestinians call the Nakba -- the "catastrophe" -- when more than 760,000 Palestinians fled or were forced from their homes by the 1948 war over Israel's creation.

Protesting taxi drivers on Tuesday blocked several vital roads and highways across the country to voice a host of demands.

The drivers blocked the Saifi road, the Beirut-Karantina highway, the Jounieh highway and the main Hamra street following a sit-in at the Riad al-Solh Square.

Hezbollah has backed down on fiery presidential stances at the request of Marada Movement chief Suleiman Franjieh, a parliamentary source from the Hezbollah-led camp said.

“Through the open communication channels between them, Franjieh relayed to Hezbollah’s leadership that there was no need to escalate in the presidential file in a way that embarrassed him and that the party could have done without it because it would obstruct his communication with the hesitant lawmakers,” the source told Asharq al-Awsat newspaper in remarks published Tuesday.