Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea returned to Beirut on Tuesday from his trip to Riyadh where he held talks with former Prime Minister Saad Hariri and a number of high-ranking Saudi officials, said the LF media department in a statement.

Geagea and Hariri held lengthy and comprehensive talks on the situation in Lebanon and the region, it added.

Interior Minister Marwan Charbel said that Defense Minister Fayez Ghosn will inform the cabinet on Wednesday about the investigations carried out by the army over the alleged presence of al-Qaida members in the eastern border town of Arsal.

In remarks to Voice of Lebanon radio station (93.3), Charbel said that Ghosn’s allegations about the operations of al-Qaida fighters in the Arsal area should be “taken into consideration.”

Prime Minister Najib Miqati will head to Paris on January, 7 to meet with President Nicolas Sarkozy, his French counterpart Francois Fillon and other senior officials, al-Liwaa newspaper reported on Tuesday.

According to the daily, the premier will discuss the latest developments in the region and Lebanon, bilateral ties and the future of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon.

Revered Lebanese spiritual leader Moussa al-Sadr, who went missing in Libya in 1978, died in the prison that he was detained at, al-Liwaa newspaper reported on Tuesday.

The report said that al-Sadr died of natural causes in the summer of 1998, while he was detained at Libya’s capital central prison in an underground cell.

A delegation from the eastern border town of Arsal visited Premier Najib Miqati on Tuesday to condemn accusations that the village is harboring al-Qaida militants.

The delegation to the Grand Serail, led by Municipal Council chief Ali al-Hujairi, urged Miqati to deploy troops near the town along the border with Syria.

The crisis on the wage hike was in a standstill on Tuesday amid speculation about the decision of the Shura Council that is expected to be issued ahead of a cabinet session scheduled to be held at Baabda palace on Wednesday.

Ministerial sources told An Nahar newspaper that if the decision of the Shura Council was in favor of the cabinet’s latest approval of the salary boost, then the problem would exacerbate amid the rejection of the Economic Committees of the wage increase which they said would lead to layoffs and closures of businesses.

Speaker Nabih Berri threatened on Tuesday the government against failing to issue the decrees concerning the implementation of decisions reached on oil exploration.

As Safir newspaper reported that Berri warned to call on the parliament to convene to question the cabinet over its performance if it didn’t issue the decrees during a session scheduled to be held at Baabda palace on Wednesday.

Former premier Saad Hariri on Monday said the Arab League should seek a “no-fly zone” over revolt-hit Syria, stressing that “everything must be done” to stop what he called a “massacre.”

“The Arab League should go to the U.N. and (seek) a no-fly zone (over Syria) and if Russia vetoes (the resolution) then a joint force should be formed with Turkey,” Hariri said on the social networking website Twitter.

Phalange Party leader Amin Gemayel on Monday said the remarks voiced by Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi in his Christmas sermon were “in line with the principles Bkirki has endorsed since the year 2000 concerning the need to accomplish national sovereignty.”

Sovereignty “can only be achieved if power is in the hand of the state,” Gemayel said in an interview on MTV.

Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat condemned Monday what he called “the twin terrorist bombings” in Damascus, stressing the need for a “political solution” in revolt-hit Syria.

“Although the timing of the two bombings in Damascus raises several question marks given that it coincided with the arrival of the Arab team of observers, that does not mean that the PSP will not strongly deplore and condemn these terrorist bombings,” Jumblat said in his weekly column in his party’s mouthpiece Al-Anbaa.