U.S. Senior Advisor for Global Energy Security and the newly appointed mediator in the U.S.-sponsored border talks between Israel and Lebanon, Amos Hochstein, has called for swift negotiations over the demarcation of the maritime border.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has suggested that disagreements over who should make financial gains had been the reason behind keeping the huge stockpile of ammonium nitrate at Beirut port for seven years before it eventually exploded in August 2020.

Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea on Thursday announced that he will not appear before the Military Court over the Tayyouneh clashes if Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah is not also summoned.

The Military Court has summoned Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea to hear his testimony over the deadly Tayyouneh clashes, media reports said on Thursday.

Al-Jadeed TV said the move comes in light of “the confessions of the detainees.”

Kataeb Party leader Sami Gemayel, who is visiting the U.S., has called through MTV for “raising the voice in the face of the hegemony that Iran is practicing on Lebanon through Hizbullah.”

President Michel Aoun met Thursday in Baabda with Prime Minister Najib Miqati to discuss the general situations in the country in light of the latest developments.

French Ambassador to Lebanon Anne Grillo on Thursday relayed a verbal message to President Michel Aoun from his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron, Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency said.

Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri has described the talks that a U.S. envoy held Wednesday in Lebanon as “more than positive.”

A delegation from the families of the Beirut port blast victims on Wednesday visited Justice Minister Henri Khoury and handed him a letter that was referred, at their request, to the Higher Judicial Council.

U.S. envoy Amos Hochstein met Wednesday with President Michel Aoun, Speaker Nabih Berri and PM Najib Miqati in a bid to rekindle moribund talks over a maritime border dispute between Lebanon and Israel that is holding up oil and gas explorations.

The Presidency said Aoun and Hochstein discussed “the course of the negotiations process regarding the sea border demarcation and the prospects in this file.”