By Hadi Khatib
Lebanonwire

As the final jostling for the remaining seats left on the national dialogue roundtable two days before the country’s leaders meet and amid messages that Lebanese will be left to fend for themselves without Arab interference, Ad-Diyar daily offered a pessimistic outlook predicting the failure of the talks before they even begin.

Lebanon’s dailies to the exclusion of Ad-Diyar spoke of a crucial and decisive political week, which will witness the participation of all the country’s leaders, including party parliamentary blocs heads, who will meet over issues pertaining to the seat of the presidency, UN Security Resolution 1559, relations with Syria and the disarming of militia weapons.

Al-Mustaqbal wrote about the possibility of using the dialogue as a forum of discussion regarding president Emile Lahoud’s illegitimate hold on power amid reassurances that the talks would not be used as compromise to halt the drive to remove the president from office. A second petition will be submitted to Parliament claiming that the presidential seat is vacant based on an earlier petition signed by current and former MPs who claimed that they were coerced into extending Lahoud’s mandate on September 3rd, 2004.

The few remaining glitches with respect to the Orthodox participation in the dialogue was being addressed as a block of seven Orthodox MPs signed a petition where they voiced their objections to the participation of MP Michel Murr who they claimed “only represents himself.” The block said in its petition it would welcome Deputy Speaker Farid Makari and An-Nahar Editor-in-Chief MP Ghassan Tueni as the best representatives of the sect at the roundtable talks.

The Future movement welcomed the scheduled dialogue as long as “it tackles the national issues at hand” and lent support to the Orthodox bloc’s objection to the talks’ exclusion of Makari describing the move “a surprising attempt at bypassing the true political and sectarian representatives by including names of participants who are in contradiction of the spirit of the talks and the basis on which dialogue was being held.”

Meanwhile Al-Balad daily reported Tuesday that representatives from the Future Movement and Hezbollah have met, “breaking the ice” that existed between the sides and paving the way for a meeting between FM leader Saad Hariri and Hezbollah’s Secretary General Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah before the talks next Thursday.

Following a meeting with Secretary General of the Arab League Amr Moussa, Speaker Nabih Berri said from Amman Jordan that so far no Arab initiative has been “in the real sense of the word” put forward. And on the issue of Lahoud, Berri said “one of the main items for discussions will be UN 1559, which is related to the presidency, an item which will be heavily discussed.” Member of the dialogue follow-up committee MP Ali Hasan Khalil added from Beirut that the first session of the talks would determine the priorities with alternating moderators being chosen on a daily basis.

Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea commented on Berri’s statement saying, “I will for sure attend, but if the issue of the presidency has not yet been finalized, then we will ask that this topic would be prioritized in order to rescue Baabda.”

An-Nahar daily reported heavy security measures would accompany the talks held in Parliament where access roads to and from the talks site would be closed to vehicle traffic.

Meanwhile, Ad-Diyar daily went on a limb saying the talks are “just a waste of time.” “Many members will sit on the roundtable talks to avoid being accused of sabotaging national dialogue efforts but not to engage in true discussions of the relevant topics, which means the dialogue is destined to fail.” The daily added that the March 14th alliance’s obsession with removing Lahoud from office and insisting on it being the main item for discussion are turning a blind eye to the tragic economic conditions of the Lebanese people, without offering any solutions to their plight.

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