United Nations Special Coordinator for Lebanon Joanna Wronecka on Thursday visited the Bekaa and Baalbek. She met with local Lebanese authorities, the UNHCR Lebanon Representative and visited a UNHCR community support project.

Central Bank interim governor Wassim Mansouri on Thursday reassured that the bank will continue to pay the salaries of the public sector in U.S. dollars, which “provides stability to 400,000 families.”

“This is not a long-term stability but rather fragile stability, and if no president is elected the economic situations will further deteriorate,” Mansouri warned, following a meeting with the Economic and Social Council of Lebanon.

The driver of a van carrying illegal Syrian migrants on Thursday ran over a Lebanese soldier and tried to flee an army patrol before being killed in the incident, an army statement said.

“As an army patrol was trying to stop a Hyundai van carrying Syrians who had illegally entered Lebanon in the al-Qbour al-Beed area on the northern border, the vehicle driver ran over a member of the patrol and tried to flee the site despite the firing of warning shots in the air by the rest of the patrol members,” the statement said.

French Special Presidential Envoy for Lebanon Jean-Yves Le Drian has met in Saudi Arabia with Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan, the Saudi foreign ministry said.

The talks tackled “the bilateral ties between the kingdom and France, means to intensify common coordination in several fields, in addition to discussing the latest developments of the Lebanese file and the regional and international events,” the ministry added.

After his dialogue initiative failed, Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri said he no longer has anything to say.

"The presidential problem is between the Maronites," Berri charged, in remarks published Thursday in al-Joumhouria newspaper.

More than 11,000 Palestine Refugees children in South Lebanon will not be able to join their peers at the beginning of the school year on 2 October. This is a quarter of refugee school children and is due to violence and clashes in the Ain el-Helweh camp, the largest in the country.

“UNRWA was forced to take this decision given all our eight schools inside the camp have been taken over by armed groups. They have sustained significant destruction and damage. Other schools – outside the camp- are currently being used by displaced families,” said Dorothée Klaus, Director of UNRWA Affairs in Lebanon.

Saudi Ambassador to Lebanon Walid Bukhari on Wednesday traveled to the Saudi capital Riyadh, Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency reported.

Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea urged Tuesday Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri to skip dialogue and call for open sessions to elect a president.

"A second electoral round would likely lead to a president," Geagea said, after Berri earlier called on those who rejected his call for dialogue to propose an alternative.

Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri has called those who rejected his call for dialogue to propose an alternative, "if they have one."

In remarks published Tuesday in al-Joumhouria newspaper, Berri announced the end of his initiative. "I no longer have anything to propose," he said. "Do they have an alternative?"

Free Patriotic Movement chief Jebran Bassil on Tuesday held talks at Dar al-Fatwa with Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdul Latif Daryan.

“There is no solution for the presidency issue except through understanding and balanced partnership, and this naturally needs dialogue. We have never been against dialogue, but we know that dialogue must be effective, that’s why we stressed to His Eminence and agreed with him that dialogue requires certain circumstances, if we don’t want to say conditions, in order for it to succeed,” Bassil said after the meeting.