Energy Minister Jebran Bassil urged on Tuesday Lebanese to deal with the oil exploration as an “exceptional” issue that needs to be resolved swiftly in order to kick off the natural resources exploration.

“We have settled the issue of setting a rotating presidency for the committee” tasked with administrating the oil sector, Bassil told As Safir newspaper.

Prime Minister Najib Miqati urged on Tuesday the Lebanese officials to resume the national dialogue which he said would be the main guideline for Lebanon to disassociate itself from the turmoil in the region.

“It’s a start for Lebanon to set the principles that highlight its neutrality in order to avoid any negative repercussions,” Miqati said in an interview with al-Joumhouria newspaper.

The cabinet is scheduled to convene at the Grand Serail on Wednesday with a 113-item agenda that lacks the controversial appointments of civil servants to posts in state institutions, media reports said.

The government resumed its functions on Monday for the first time since Feb. 1 when Premier Najib Miqati suspended the sessions after he bickered with ministers loyal to Free Patriotic Movement leader Michel Aoun following accusations that he named candidates for top posts reserved for Christians without consulting them.

Speaker Nabih Berri stressed Tuesday that a controversial extra-budgetary spending would be resolved through the adoption of a $5.9 billion spending bill first to pave way for a solution to $11 billion spent between 2006 and 2009.

In remarks to As Safir daily, Berri said that parliament should “first legalize the $5.9 billion, which the opposition March 14 forces had initially agreed to, so that the $11 billion problem could be resolved.”

Hizbullah’s international relations officer, Ammar al-Moussawi, on Monday slammed “those occupying ministerial posts and making wrong bets,” accusing them of “impeding the government’s productivity.”

“This government is supposed to be responsible for the national duties, topped by the responsibility for preserving social and economic stability,” Moussawi said.

Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat has slammed the referendum held in Syria on a new constitution for the revolt-hit country, noting that a Yemen-style solution was the best to resolve the crisis.

“Wretched are those days when constitutional theatricals are being held over the remains of bodies and amid the roar of cannons and the sound of bullets,” Jumblat said in a weekly column in his party’s al-Anbaa newspaper to be published Tuesday.

Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi on Sunday stressed the importance of “broadening bilateral ties with Lebanon, particularly in the defense field,” during talks with Defense Minister Fayez Ghosn in Tehran, the Iranian news agency ISNA reported.

Ghosn and Salehi discussed bilateral, regional and international issues, it said.

Grand Mufti Sheikh Mohammed Rashid Qabbani headed on Monday an urgent meeting of Sunni religious scholars after a controversy erupted over his call for the elections of the Higher Islamic Council on April 22.

A statement issued after the meeting held at Dar al-Fatwa said the conferees stressed “the importance of the Islamic and national role of the Mufti … in unifying the Muslims and Lebanese.”

Two Syrian teenagers were kidnapped from their home in the area of Karak near the eastern city of Zahle at dawn Monday, their mother claimed.

Jumana Izzeddine, a Syrian national, told security forces that several armed men broke into her house and kidnapped her sons Baraa, 16 and 14-year-old Ali.

Hizbullah on Monday denied media reports claiming that party officials had tried in vain to mediate to prevent security forces from seizing arms from the home of a party member in Beirut’s southern suburbs.

“Nizar al-Husseini is neither an official nor a member in the party,” Hizbullah’s media relations unit said in a statement.