Speaker Nabih Berri has warned Prime Minister Tammam Salam against “contributing to” the cabinet's paralysis, noting that the ministers of his AMAL Movement and its ally Hizbullah will attend the cabinet's upcoming sessions.
“I support holding the sessions if there is a legal quorum and this is what is stipulated by the Constitution, which some parties are interpreting according to their whims and interests,” Berri told An Nahar newspaper in remarks published Sunday, in an apparent jab at the Free Patriotic Movement which is boycotting cabinet and national dialogue meetings.
The cabinet “is required to sign the decrees that it has been issuing,” the speaker added, pointing out that “the ministers are yet to put their signatures on the resolutions of the session that was boycotted by the ministers Jebran Bassil and Elias Bou Saab.”
Addressing Salam, who is currently in New York for international meetings, Berri cautioned that “if PM Salam does not call for sessions, he would be contributing to paralyzing or even executing the cabinet.”
The speaker has long defended Salam's government, warning that it has no “alternative.”