A meeting held between head of al-Mustaqbal movement leader Saad Hariri's adviser and Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea following his candidacy to the presidential elections was to confirm the “strong ties” between the allies.

According to al-Joumhouria newspaper published on Monday, Nader al-Hariri and Geagea's meeting “came at a time to stress the strong ties between the factions of the independent move and the consultations between them.”

Interior Minister Nouhad al-Mashnouq has held onto a security plan as officials said security agencies would seek to arrest more than 50 people whose names are on a list of wanted suspects in the eastern Bekaa Valley.

In remarks to al-Mustaqbal daily published on Monday, al-Mashnouq said: “There is no going back on the security plan and there is no hesitation.”

Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah claimed Hizbullah's responsibility for an attack on an Israeli military patrol in the occupied Shebaa Farms area last month.

Nasrallah told As Safir daily in an interview published on Monday that the roadside bomb ambush was carried out by the resistance in response to an Israeli raid in February on one of its positions in an area near the Lebanese-Syrian border.

Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblat held talks recently in Paris with senior French officials, who stressed the need to stage the Lebanese Presidential elections within the constitutional time-frame, local newspapers reported on Monday.

According to al-Joumhouria newspaper, French officials briefed Jumblat, who is on a private visit to France, the importance of electing a strong president capable of facing the current challenges.

Speaker Nabih Berri is expected to call for the first round of parliamentary sessions to elect a new president next week, An Nahar newspaper reported on Monday.

According to the daily, the first electoral session will be held on April 16.

Some of March 14's supporters are with Hizbullah's military intervention in Syria and the Syrian regime is “not facing the threat of collapse anymore,” Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah has announced.

“We're not facing a problem with our supporters regarding our involvement in Syria. On the contrary, some of those who were hesitant have now made up their minds and decided to support our choice,” Nasrallah said in excerpts of an interview with As Safir newspaper that will be published Monday.

A list backed by the March 14 forces won the elections of the Order of Engineers and Architects of Tripoli on Sunday as the rival political camps resorted to a consensus list in Beirut to avoid a heated electoral battle.

Marios al-Baaini of the Lebanese Forces was elected as the head of the Tripoli order amid the victory of four members belonging to the al-Mustaqbal movement, the Jamaa Islamiya and the Kataeb party. An “incomplete” list backed by the March 8 forces ran in the elections, according to the National News Agency.

A number of Civil Defense volunteers on Sunday blocked several roads across Lebanon to press for the approval by parliament of a law that would turn them into full-timers.

Meanwhile, Interior Minister Nouhad al-Mashnouq contacted the parliament's general secretary, expressing willingness to discuss his observations over the law, which he had asked parliament to suspend its debate during last Wednesday's session.

The Internal Security Forces on Sunday announced the arrest of nine people, after Sidon resident Wadiha al-Baidawi was killed Friday by celebratory gunfire while watching a wedding from the window of her apartment in Sidon.

The 19-year-old woman was killed after being hit by a bullet to the head, the ISF said in a statement.

The Lebanese army arrested on Sunday a number of armed Syrians in the Bekaa region of Arsal, reported Voice of Lebanon radio (93.3).

It said that a shootout broke out between the army and the five Syrians when they opened fire at an army patrol in the Wadi Hmayyed area.