Lahoud calls for parliamentary consultations to nominate the prime minister

The Lebanese President Emil Lahoud called for carrying out parliamentary consultations today, Friday, in order to nominate a new prime minister designated to form a government to lead the country into parliamentary elections and to supervise them.

Meantime, the opposition parliamentarians in the Lebanese parliament on Thursday evening ended a series of consultations to discuss the government's taking a unified position concerning the parliamentary elections and nominating a candidate for the premiership.

News reports in Beirut said that the meeting ended without reaching an agreement and the consultations will be resumed today.

Meantime, the minister of the interior in the resigned government Suleiman Franjieh warned that the delay of the elections might lead to violence and called for carrying out them at the set time.

Franjieh expected the former minister of public works Najib Miqati to form the government and held Lahoud and the speaker of the parliament Nabih Berri as well as Karami responsible for not forming the government so far. He said in statements to the press that they sought to form a government according to their own conditions.

Franjieh, who is a main political alley to Damascus, said he refuses to take part in any government under the rule of the current Lebanese President Emil Lahoud. A matter which indicates that there are deep differences inside the political alliance which supports Syria.