The defense team of Hizbullah suspect Mustafa Badreddine challenged the jurisdiction of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon by submitting a preliminary motion, al-Akhbar daily reported Saturday.

The move came on Friday before the May 4 deadline set by Pre-Trial Judge Daniel Fransen to file motions challenging the tribunal's jurisdiction, it said.

Minister of State Panos Manjian has confirmed that the cabinet will convene in Baabda Palace next Wednesday to discuss the extra-budgetary spending and 35 other articles on its agenda.

In remarks to Voice of Lebanon radio station (93.3), Manjian said the agenda that was distributed to the cabinet ministers on Friday night includes 36 articles led by the spending issue.

A March 8 coalition leader has recently told U.N. Special Coordinator for Lebanon Derek Plumbly that the world body should help Lebanon in the investigation of an arms ship intercepted by the Lebanese army to save its reputation, As Safir daily reported on Saturday.

The newspaper said the March 8 leader asked Plumbly how the ship was able to enter Lebanon’s territorial waters despite all the measures taken by UNIFIL’s naval unit.

Free Patriotic Movement leader Michel Aoun is expected on Saturday to snap back at President Michel Suleiman, Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblat and al-Mustaqbal movement at a rally that would set the stage for future campaigns by his party ahead of the 2013 parliamentary polls.

The FPM is organizing the rally at the Platea theater in Sahel Alma in Kesrouan district on the seventh anniversary of Aoun’s return from exile to Paris.

Speaker Nabih Berri has found no reason in postponing Thursday’s cabinet session and reiterated that he would hold the government accountable if it continues to procrastinate on decisions linked to oil exploration.

There was no justification in postponing the session “amid the circumstances and the strikes carried out by more than one sector,” An Nahar daily on Saturday quoted Berri as saying.

Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat has announced that he does not intend to rejoin the March 14 camp, slamming the Free Patriotic Movement as an “irrational” political movement that is “paralyzing everything.”

Commenting on his recent trip to Saudi Arabia in an interview to be published on Saturday, Jumblat hoped to restore his previous relation with the kingdom, saying Riyadh was dismayed by his support in 2011 for the nomination of Prime Minister Najib Miqati for premiership following the collapse of Saad Hariri’s government.

The debate flared up again on Friday between the Syrian and Saudi ambassadors to Lebanon over the issue of a Syria-bound arms ship recently seized in Lebanon’s territorial waters.

Syrian ambassador Ali Abdul Karim Ali declared on NBN television that he has severed ties with Saudi ambassador Ali Awadh Asiri, saying “he’s the one who dealt an unfriendly blow to a brotherly relation.”

An Israeli military unit crossed on Friday the Blue Line near the area of al-Shahil in Shebaa.

Al-Manar television reported that a shepherd in the area escaped a kidnapping attempt by Israeli troops.

President Michel Suleiman shrugged off on Thursday the pressure exerted on him by Hizbullah, Amal and the Free Patriotic Movement to sign the $5.9 billion extra-budgetary spending bill.

In remarks to reporters based in Baabda Palace, Suleiman reiterated his rejection to sign the bill that is set to legalize the spending of Prime Minister Najib Miqati’s government .

Defense Minister Fayez Ghosn said on Friday that progress has been achieved in the investigations in the arms smuggling ship that was intercepted off the Batroun coast a week ago.

He said in a statement: “The investigations should be allowed to take their course and the issue should not be the subject of political speculation.”