Prime Minister-designate Tammam Salam has completed his separate talks with the parliamentary blocs of the Hizbullah-led March 8 alliance but is waiting for their united stance on an offer to form a government in which the coalition would get seven ministers.

Local dailies said Saturday that the last meeting Salam held the day before was with Tashnag party MP Hagop Pakradounian.

Several workers were injured when an under-construction building collapsed in al-Beddawi area near Tripoli, state-run National News Agency reported.

NNA identified the owner of the building as Mahmoud Seif, adding that the wounded were rushed to hospitals in the area.

Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat on Friday called on Russia to exert efforts to end the war that has been raging in Syria for more than two years.

During talks in Mukhtara with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov, Jumblat said: “We see in Bogdanov's visit an additional indication on the Lebanese-Russian friendship and Mukhtara will not forget the moral, material and political support offered by Russia when Lebanon was facing the partitioning scheme.”

Bulgarian investigators on Friday re-enacted a July 2012 bomb attack blamed by Sofia on Hizbullah that killed five Israelis, blowing up two old buses and 11 silicon mannequins in a controlled explosion.

The aim was "to provide information and important evidence on the type and quantity of explosive used" in the attack at Burgas airport on the Black Sea, chief investigator Boyko Naydenov said.

Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat held talks on Friday with Speaker Nabih Berri on the government formation process and the parliamentary electoral law.

He said after the meeting at Ain el-Tineh: “We discussed several proposals over the law and I will issue a stance over one of them within 24 hours.”

The Israeli army increased its security alert along the border with Lebanon a day after it accused Hizbullah of sending a drone that it shot down several miles off the coast of the northern city of Haifa.

According to the state-run National News Agency, the Lebanese army and the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) deployed heavily along the border “to prevent any military escalation.”

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov handed over on Friday to President Michel Suleiman a letter of support from his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin.

Putin hailed in the letter to the efforts exerted by Suleiman to maintain stability in Lebanon, expressing support to the resumption of the all-party talks and to the dissociation policy adopted by the Lebanese government.

The Progressive Socialist Party of MP Walid Jumblat submitted on Friday a challenge before the constitutional council over the suspension of the electoral deadlines set by the 1960 law.

The council has one month to either accept or reject the challenge.

Speaker Nabih Berri revealed on Friday that he will reactivate the meetings of the electoral subcommittee if he perceived positive signs from the rival parties.

“I began contacting the representatives of the foes participating in the subcommittee as it is crucial to reach an electoral law ahead of the parliamentary session set on May 15,” Berri said in comments published in several newspapers.

President Michel Suleiman slammed Lebanon's rival parties for failing to agree on a new electoral law, stressing that he would challenge any attempt to extend parliament’s mandate.

In an interview with al-Mustaqbal daily published Friday, Suleiman said: “All the countries surrounding us are suffering from major problems and bloodshed so that the people could have the right to vote.”