Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi stressed on Friday the need to stage the presidential elections on time, saying that he does not have the right to interfere in the elections.

He said upon his return to Lebanon from a trip to Geneva: “I have not rejected the nomination of any March 8 or 14 camp presidential candidate and I do not have the right to refuse any bid.”

A demonstration that was planned to take place on Friday to protest the arrest warrants issued against hundreds of the northern city of Tripoli's residents has been called off, after the interference of several political figures.

A group of young men had called via social media platforms for a “mass demonstration” in Abdul Hamid Karami Square in Tripoli after Friday's prayers, to demand withdrawing the arrest warrants issued against hundreds of the city's residents.

State security forces arrested on Thursday a car theft gang in the eastern Bekaa Valley as part of the implementation of the security plan in the region, reported the National News Agency on Friday.

It said that the five-member Lebanese gang's activities were limited to robbing vehicles and later selling them or trading them for drugs.

Tensions between Speaker Nabih Berri and the Association of Banks in Lebanon eased on Friday after signs of a dispute were beginning to emerge between the two sides over the funding of the new wage scale.

The speaker had earlier during the day refused to meet with the ABL before its apologizes for its stance concerning the tax measures proposed by the joint parliamentary committees to fund the new wage scale.

As he pushes a cart full of tomatoes and cucumbers in the market at Bint Jbeil in southern Lebanon, nothing marks out Mahmoud as an experienced Hizbullah fighter.

The stocky vegetable vendor in his fifties, who sports a red beard, fought Israel in 2006, but that battle is now old news.

Vatican officials have expressed fears that a possible vacuum in the presidency would harm the role of Christians in state institutions, al-Joumhouria daily reported Friday.

The newspaper quoted the officials as saying that the election of a new president was urgent amid the turmoil in Lebanon and the region.

Al-Mustaqbal parliamentary bloc leader MP Fouad Saniora is in Riyadh to brief al-Mustaqbal movement chief ex-Premier Saad Hariri on the results of consultations held in Beirut over the presidential elections.

An Nahar daily said Friday that Saniora was accompanied by Nader Hariri, the adviser of al-Mustaqbal movement leader.

Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea revealed on Friday that he will propose to Hizbullah if he was elected as president “real partnership,” considering that the theory of “vacuum at the presidential post is better than choosing a weak head of state” has crumbled after he ran for the presidency.

“I will suggest real partnership with Hizbullah to build a state that is capable with the army's weapons as the only means to protect all the citizens,” Geagea said in an interview with As Safir newspaper.

Speaker Nabih Berri on Thursday called on the ambassadors of Arab and foreign states not to interfere in the upcoming presidential election, which is supposed to be held before May 25.

“Foreign ambassadors must not interfere in this election and must leave a chance to 'Lebanonize' it and allow it to take its course,” National Media Council chief Abdul Hadi Mahfouz quoted Berri as saying after he met the speaker in parliament.

The joint parliamentary committees approved on Thursday imposing fines on illegal seaside properties as part of the plan to fund the new wage scale, reported several media outlets.

They approved the article on imposing fines on seaside properties with a retroactive effect of five years.