A group of 39 Palestinians carrying Lebanese passports were waiting in a restricted area of the Barcelona airport for a fifth day Friday after they refused to board their flight during a stopover because they wanted to request asylum in Spain, the country's authorities said.

Their flight on Monday departed from Cairo and had the Ecuadorean capital, Quito, as its final destination, with scheduled stopovers in Spain's second-largest city and Bogotá, in Colombia, a spokeswoman with the Spanish government's delegation in the northeastern Catalonia region said. Barcelona is the regional capital of Catalonia.

Prime Minister Najib Miqati told President Michel Aoun Friday that he will soon call for a Cabinet session and that things will return to normalcy.

For its part, the Presidency said that Aoun has been briefed by Miqati on the work of the ministerial panels and that "it has been decided to resume Cabinet sessions soon."

Iraq has summoned its cultural attaché in Beirut for an investigation into the alleged sale of "hundreds" of fake Lebanese university degrees to Iraqis, including MPs.

"At least three private Lebanese universities are implicated," an Iraqi academic source, who requested to remain anonymous, told AFP.

A Progressive Socialist Party delegation led by MP Taymour Jumblat and MP Wael Abu Faour has met with al-Mustaqbal Movement leader ex-PM Saad Hariri in the United Arab Emirates, al-Jadeed television reported.

PSP sources meanwhile told al-Jadeed that the talks were “comprehensive” and that several topics were discussed.

The Court of Cassation’s general assembly on Thursday finished a meeting on two lawsuits filed against the state in the port case without taking any decision, the National News Agency said.

The meeting, presided over by Court chief Judge Suheil Abboud, tackled two lawsuits filed by ex-ministers who are charged in the case.

On his first visit over two-days to Lebanon’s second largest city, British Ambassador to Lebanon Ian Collard toured UK-funded projects in Tripoli and surrounding areas and met city officials, as well as the embassy’s project partners and beneficiaries.

Amal and Hizbullah’s sources have faulted Higher Judicial Council head Suheil Abboud for a perceived Christian-Muslim judicial split, al-Joumhouria newspaper said.

Sources of the Shiite duo told al-Joumhouria, in remarks published Thursday, that Amal and Hizbullah are standing their ground against port blast lead investigator Judge Tarek Bitar, adding that the main problem is Abboud.

Fears of infection. Loneliness. Worries about physical health.

As the coronavirus spread across borders early in the pandemic, calls to global helplines showed a striking similarity in the toll on mental health — from Lebanon to China, Finland to Slovenia.

Lebanon has said that only foreigners with Belarusian residency permits would be allowed to fly from Beirut to the ex-Soviet country, amid a migrant crisis on its border with Poland.

"Many Arab and foreign travelers have recently arrived in Belarus from Beirut via flights of various airlines," including Belarus's state-run Belavia airline, the transport ministry's directorate general of civil aviation said.

Prime Minsiter Najib Miqati stressed Wednesday the necessity of resuming Cabinet sessions and of making the required steps to solve the recent row with the Gulf states.

He said that contacts are being made to find a solution based on constitutional and legal foundations, adding that ministerial meetings and workshops are being held in order to facilitate administrative work and put things on the right track.