Hariri Leads Delegation to CEDRE Conference in Paris

Prime Minister Saad Hariri and a delegation of ministers and officials traveled to France late on Wednesday to partake in Friday's CEDRE conference where some 50 states and international financial institutions will participate, Hariri's press office said Thursday.

The Lebanese delegation is comprised of ministers Ali Hassan Khalil, Jebran Bassil, Youssef Fenianos, Raed Khoury and Cesar Abi Khalil, Central Bank governor Riad Salameh, the Chairman of the Social and Economic Council Charles Arbid, the advisers to President Michel Aoun, Elias Abu Saab and Mireille Aoun, and Hariri’s chief of staff Nader Hariri and his advisor Nadim Munla.

Lebanon is hoping to raise billions of dollars at the France-led donor meeting on Friday to stave off an economic crisis in the world's third most indebted country.

Growth in the small Mediterranean country has plummeted in the wake of repeated political crises, compounded by the 2011 breakout of civil war in neighboring Syria.

The Syrian war has sent one million Syrian refugees in flight to Lebanon, a country of only four million before the conflict.

The Paris conference comes as Lebanon gears up for its first general elections in almost a decade in May, after parliament renewed its own mandate three times since 2009.

The Middle Eastern country hopes donor countries and financial institutions at the CEDRE conference will help stimulate the economy through investment.

Lebanon hopes to raise "between $6 billion and $7 billion in the shape of credit facilities and funds," Munla has said.