"If we let go of Lebanon, it will be a civil war", warned French President Emmanuel Macron on Friday, who is due to return to Beirut next week to try to unblock the political impasse which is preventing the formation of a government capable of raise the country.
"If we let Lebanon go in the region, if in a way we leave it in the hands of the turpitudes of the regional powers, it will be civil war" and "the defeat of what is the very identity of Lebanon", in crisis and victim of a devastating explosion in early August at the port of Beirut, said the head of state to the Presidential Press Association in Paris.
Reforms to be carried out
The French president spoke of the “constraints of a denominational system” which, “added - to speak modestly - to related interests”, led “to a situation where there is hardly any renewal (political) and where there is there is almost an impossibility of carrying out reforms ”.
Following a line of "demand without interference", he cited the reforms to be carried out: "pass the anti-corruption law, reform public contracts, reform the energy sector" and the banking system. “If we do not do this, the Lebanese economy will collapse” and “the only victim will be the Lebanese people (…) who cannot go into exile”, he warned.
Back in Lebanon on Tuesday
Yet Lebanon “is perhaps one of the last existing forms of what we believe in in this region: that is to say the most peaceful possible coexistence of religions (…), of a pluralist model which is based on education, culture, the ability to trade in peace ”, argued the French president.
Emmanuel Macron had already made a lightning visit two days after the explosion at the port of Beirut of a huge amount of ammonium nitrate, which left around 180 dead in early August.
The head of state will return Tuesday morning to the devastated neighborhoods, where he will take stock of the clearing operations and the distribution of aid. But Emmanuel Macron is especially expected on his ability to unblock the inextricable political crisis, nearly three weeks after the resignation of the government of Hassan Diab.
Politics
"The risk today is the disappearance of Lebanon", warns Paris
World
Explosion in Beirut: The weight of an Eiffel Tower of debris cleared in four days
- Diplomacy
- Lebanon
- Emmanuel Macron