Two explosions were heard in Ain al-Remmaneh at dawn Thursday, as two percussion bombs were thrown in the area, damaging shops and cars.

The persons who threw the bombs remain unknown.

As the war in Ukraine rages on, diplomats trying to salvage the languishing 2015 Iran nuclear deal have been forging ahead with negotiations despite distractions caused by the conflict. They now appear to be near the cusp of a deal that would bring the U.S. back into the accord and bring Iran back into compliance with limits on its nuclear program.

After 11 months of on-and-off talks in Vienna, U.S. officials and others say only a very small number of issues remain to be resolved. Meanwhile, Russia appears to have backed down on a threat to crater an agreement over Ukraine-related sanctions that had dampened prospects for a quick deal.

The Cabinet on Wednesday approved the long-awaited electricity plant, the information minister said after the session, while noting that the power plant that will be set up in the North will not necessarily be in the town of Selaata.

Moreover, the sector’s regulatory commission will be formed in 2022, not in 2023, while some articles and environmental conditions were amended, Information Minister Ziad Makari said.

Relatives of Beirut port blast victims staged a protest Wednesday outside the residence of Justice Minister Henri Khoury.

“Cowardly Minister!” was one of the phrases that they wrote on the external walls of Khoury’s apartment. The protesters also wrote names of victims.

The French and Saudi officials who met in Paris on Tuesday discussed “the coordination of the executive steps that have been agreed to assist Lebanon, especially through the joint fund that has been set up for this purpose,” sources who accompanied the Saudi visit to Paris said.

“Not a single penny of the Saudi aid parcel for the Lebanese will pass through the official Lebanese institutions,” the sources told Nidaa al-Watan newspaper in remarks published Wednesday.

Despite its withdrawal from parliamentary elections, al-Mustaqbal Movement is still present in the electoral equation and is pushing for a major Sunni boycott of the polls, a media report said on Wednesday.

Ex-PM Saad Hariri is “exerting strenuous efforts to ensure a very low Sunni voter turnout in all regions, with the aim of consolidating his leadership and confining the Sunnis to him as a figure,” al-Akhbar newspaper reported.

Japanese prosecutors filed an appeal Wednesday against the verdict in the trial of former Nissan executive Greg Kelly, who recently was cleared of almost all charges he had faced related to alleged under-reporting of his former boss Carlos Ghosn's pay.

The Tokyo District Court handed down a six-month sentence suspended for three years earlier this month. It found Kelly, an American, guilty of under-reporting former Nissan Chairman Ghosn's compensation for just one of the eight years cited in the charges.

Lebanese authorities on Wednesday seized the assets of Fransabank, one of the country’s biggest banks, based on an order issued by Judge Mariana Anani, the head of the Enforcement Department in Beirut.

The order followed a lawsuit filed by the depositor Ayyad Gherbawi Ibrahim who requested that he be paid his money in banknotes and not through a check.

Hizbullah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah has said that Hizbullah will work for the success of its allies in the parliamentary elections.

Interior Minister Bassam Mawlawi announced Wednesday that Lebanon is ready to hold the elections, as doors have closed for parliament candidacy with 1043 candidates.

He asked the civil and international communities to monitor the elections and make sure they are transparent.