Geagea: We Do not Agree with Berri over Package Deal

Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea said on Tuesday that the package deal suggested by Speaker Nabih Berri, was flatly inadmissible, stressing that MP Michel Aoun will not negotiate any settlement to help him reach the presidential post.

“There cannot be a new national contract at every due date,” said Geagea from Bkirki after a meeting with Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi.

“What will the (new) president do if we are imposing conditions on the government from today? The election of a president must happen when lawmakers head to the parliament, and then comes the designation of a prime minister,” he added.

“Aoun has not and will not negotiate over the package deal, and we will not as well,” he said, as he remarked “recently we have noticed that there is no agreement between Aoun, Hizbullah and the AMAL movement.”

The Lebanese Forces and the Free Patriotic Mnemosyne have voiced rejection to Berri's deal that calls for shortening the term of parliament and that the elections be held based on the 1960 law should political forces fail to agree on a new electoral one.

He also called for staging the presidential elections after the parliamentary ones and forming a national unity government.