March 14 to boycott the vote of confidence session, report

Sources closely associated with March 14 alliance told Kuwaiti newspaper al Jareedah that the alliance will boycott the cabinet’s vote of confidence session at the parliament meeting in an attempt to undermine the constitutionality of the newly formed cabinet , specially because the largest Sunni parliamentary bloc won’t be present .

The sources said March 14 will not enter the main parliament hall to vote, and abstaining from voting will render the session unconstitutional .

Thursday will be the third and last day of the parliamentary session aimed to debate the ministerial policy statement of newly-formed government and to grant it the vote of confidence.

Ya Libnan could not confirm al Jareedah’s report

There were also unconfirmed reports that outgoing PM Saad Hariri will make a surprise visit to Beirut on Thursday , but again due to security reasons this may be just another rumor since he reportedly received many threats on his life.

March 14 MP Mohammad Hajjar said on Wednesday that the primary mission of the newly-formed government is to confront the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, a UN-backed court investigating the 2005 murder of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, calling on the cabinet to quit adding that he will not grant it his vote of confidence.

Hezbollah and its allies deliberately brought down the government of outgoing PM Saad Hariri in January in anticipation of the indictment in the murder of his father .

STL confirmed the indictments in the assassination of Lebanon’s former PM Hariri on Thursday. An STL delegation met with Lebanon’s state prosecutor Said Mirza on Thursday and handed him a copy of the Lebanon portion of the indictment and the arrest warrants. Two of the suspects Mustafa Badreddine and Salim Ayyash are reportedly senior members of the Iranian and Syrian-backed Hezbollah while the other two Hezbollah members Hassan Aneissy, also known as Hassan Issa, and Assad Sabra played a supporting role in the execution of the assassination.

Lebanon has 30 days to find and arrest the suspects but Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah said Saturday that the party would not cooperate with the tribunal.

“No Lebanese government will be able to carry out any arrests whether in 30 days, 30 years or even 300 years.”

“We reject the Special Tribunal for Lebanon along with each and every void accusation it issues, which to us is the equivalent of an attack against Hezbollah,” Nasrallah added in his hour-long speech.

Nasrallah admitted all the four suspects are Hezbollah members:

“The suspects named in the indictment are brothers who have an honorable history in resisting Israeli occupation.” He said

The whereabouts of the four remain unknown but some reports indicated that the two prime suspects in the assassination already fled to Iran.

Professor Ghassan Karam commented about Nasrallah’s defiance in an article in Ya Libnan: ” Nasrallah has acted as judge, jury and executioner. He has determined that his people are not guilty and that no one should dream of arresting any of them”.

“My only advice to those charged is that they should consult a lawyer as soon as possible…Now is the time for defense.” Francois Roux, the head of the Defense Office of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon said in addressing the four Hezbollah members who were indicted in the 2005 assassination of former Lebanese PM Rafik Hariri

Update: Al Mustaqbal has just denied reports that outgoing PM Saad Hariri will be in Beirut on Thursday