BEIRUT: Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati was designated on Thursday to form a new government, but faces a politically difficult path to agree a new cabinet as the country’s devastating financial crisis festers.
The Sunni Muslim billionaire was nominated premier for a fourth time after securing the support of 54 of parliament’s 128 lawmakers, including the Iran-backed Shiite Muslim party Hezbollah, in consultations convened by President Michel Aoun.
But with splits running deep among Lebanon’s ruling elite, it is widely believed Mikati will struggle to form a government, spelling political paralysis that could hamper reforms agreed with the IMF to unlock aid.
Now in its third year, the financial meltdown has sunk the currency by more than 90 percent, spread poverty, paralyzed the financial system and frozen depositors out of their savings, in Lebanon’s most destabilising crisis since the 1975-90 civil war.
Mikati, who has already served as prime minister three times, continues in a caretaker role until a government is formed, a process that typically goes on for months as political factions divvy up roles in cabinet and beyond.
Analysts and politicians expect this cabinet formation process to be further complicated by a looming struggle over who will replace Aoun, the Hezbollah-aligned Maronite Christian head of state, when his term ends on Oct. 31.
Parliament — which elects the new president — emerged highly fractured from a general election last month. The heavily armed Hezbollah and its allies lost their majority, reform-minded newcomers made a strong showing and the Christian Lebanese Forces party gained seats.
Reflecting the new landscape, Mikati, who hails from the northern city of Tripoli, secured around 20 fewer votes than when he was last designated prime minister in September.
Forty-six lawmakers named no one for the post, while 25 voted for Nawaf Salam, a former Lebanese ambassador to the United Nations and now a judge at the International Court of Justice.
Mikati’s cabinet secured a draft IMF funding deal worth $3 billion in April, contingent on the implementation of reforms which Lebanon’s ruling factions have long obstructed.
An IMF deal is widely seen as the gateway to easing the financial crisis, but the political and financial elite remain divided on the details, including how to share out an estimated $70 billion in losses in the financial system.
Lebanon’s Mikati named PM, faces tough path to cabinet
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Lebanon’s Mikati named PM, faces tough path to cabinet
- The Sunni Muslim billionaire was nominated premier for a fourth time after securing the support of 54 of parliament's 128 lawmakers
- But with splits running deep among Lebanon's ruling elite, it is widely believed Mikati will struggle to form a government
Syria accuses Hezbollah of firing shells into its territory
- “The Syrian Arab Army will not tolerate any aggression targeting Syria,” the army said in a statement to SANA
DAMASCUS: Syria said Iran-backed Hezbollah had fired artillery shells into its territory from Lebanon overnight, state media reported on Tuesday, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Lebanese Shia movement.
Syrian army officials said artillery shells fired from Lebanon landed near the town of Serghaya, west of Damascus, the state news agency SANA reported on Tuesday.
The army accused Hezbollah of targeting Syrian army positions, telling the news agency it observed Hezbollah reinforcements at the Syrian-Lebanese border.
“The Syrian Arab Army will not tolerate any aggression targeting Syria,” the army said in a statement to SANA.
Lebanon was drawn into the Middle East war last week when Hezbollah attacked Israel in response to the killing of Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei during US-Israeli strikes.
Hezbollah and Israeli forces have clashed in eastern Lebanon in recent days, and Israel has carried out strikes across Lebanon, including on the capital Beirut.
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun accused Hezbollah of working to “collapse” the state, while the head of the group’s parliamentary bloc said it had “no other option... than the option of resistance.”
Hezbollah provided military support to former Syrian president Bashar Assad, who was overthrown in December 2024 by an Islamist coalition hostile to the pro-Iranian Shia movement.
Since then, its supply routes from Syria have been cut off, and Lebanese and Syrian authorities are trying to combat smuggling across the porous border between the two countries.
