Lebanon:DAILY SCOPE: Agreement on Sea Delineation, Smell of ...

DAILY SCOPE: Agreement on Sea Delineation, Smell of Garbage Crisis Re-emerges

Zeinab Daher

LEBANESE DAILIES

Lebanese dailies shed the light today on the Lebanese parties' agreement to delineate sea borders with the Occupied Palestine.

They also discussed the re-emergence of the smell of trash, few days after closing the Bourj Hammoud Landfill, in parallel with Speaker of the Parliament Nabih Berri's statement that it is impossible to extend the parliament's rule.

AS-SAFIR:
Sea Delineation: Trilateral Committee... Washington "if Necessary"

As-Safir newspaper found that Lebanon has reached a united stance towards the sea borders issue with the Occupied Palestine, and the way to delineate them after negotiations with Speaker of the Parliament Nabih Berri and the main concerned Lebanese parties.

The Americans were lately informed about this united official stance, while Lebanon is waiting Washington's response to its proposal, upon which the decision would be made, without meaning that the progress in the Beirut-Washington ebb and flow regarding the sea borders would justify the continuous delay in ratifying the oil decrees by the Lebanese Cabinet, paving the way for offering some "blocks" before contracting them, especially that there is no direct relation between the two issues.

Lebanon suggests delineating the sea line with the Occupied Palestine, on the basis that was applied when assigning the "blue line" on ground, in which the 1701 resolution would be the only umbrella for the sea delineation, just like the issue on the ground.

Lebanon also suggests that army, UNIFIL and "Israeli" enemy officers would undergo discussions regarding the sea borders [al-Naqoura] in cooperation with technical experts, in which the Americans' help would be sought if necessary, mainly in the case of insolvable disagreements, under the condition that they don't be permanent member of the committee.

The official Lebanese concern aims, upon keeping the sea borders delineation committee purely technical, at not oversizing its true size, and hence preventing any attempt to suggest that there are dual negotiations, with a political or oil cover, between the "Israeli" entity and the Lebanese government.

From this point, Lebanon insisted on having a UNIFIL representative, [instead of the New York-based United Nations as it was supposed], to avoid any "maleficent" analyses or explanations.

Berri stressed to his visitors that the oil file is in progress, expressing comfort that the internal parties were able to show a united position towards the sea borders delineation, adding that the 1701 should be the only frame of this process.

AN-NAHAR:
Government Stuck to its Trash Plan

On the trash issue, ministerial sources told an-Nahar that the government is adhered to its plan, not because it rejects revising it, but because it considers the plan the best to prevent trash from storming the streets again. The sources added that the PM stressed the government's rejection of Beirut Municipality's demand to detach the treatment of Beirut trash form the general plan, noting that the issue threatened the possibility of disputes between PM Tamam Salam and Interior Minister Nouhad al-Machnouq who supports the demand of the capital's municipality.

An-Nahar sources reported some side's attempts to find new landfills in coordination with unexperienced companies under the cover of decentralization, with the support of some sides that previously rejected the decentralization of Minister Shehayeb's first plan. The sources also noted that there is competition between the trash companies' cartel and the oil companies' cartel at the Bourj Hammoud shore, and that there is a huge commercial community that has a plan of extension along this shore, which wants to close the Bourj Hammoud landfill.

Minister Shehayeb will stress today in the Finance and Budgeting Committee's meeting adhering to the government's plan, and will hold the opposers responsibility of the escalation of the trash crisis in al-Ashrafiyeh, Maten and Keserwan, the sources added. They further expected that the Union of Maten Municipalities and the Bourj Hammoud Municipality would issue a joint statement in which they will support Shehayeb's plan.

AL-AKHBAR:
Maten, Keserwan Municipalities Threaten Sukleen: Partial Solutions for the Trash Crisis

Regarding the garbage crisis, al-Akhbar newspaper wrote that following the meeting of Jdaydeh, al-Boucharieh Sad, Fanar and Ain S'aade municipalities, and deciding to establish a factory to sort their own garbage in the industrial valley in the Nahr al-Mawt region within six months, al-Akhbar learned that the Sin el-Fil Municipality, belonging to the Phalanges Party and MP Michael al-Morr, will make a decision soon about its garbage, in which the card of accumulating the trash would be withdrawn from Sukleen. Not to mention that the Phalanges Bekfayya Municipality has started a temporary solution that provides making the necessary steps that include several neighboring villages.

Back to the Sahel al-Maten Shemali, some MP started coordinating communications between Jal Dib, Bsalim, Antelias and a private company that would start distributing two types of garbage bags to houses, and collecting the trash every evening, then sending them to the sorting factory to be recycled in al-Koura. As for the unrecyclable trash, the contracted company has several options that it finds convenient, noting that the municipality doesn't have to pay any expenses since the private company sells the bags for the citizens and gain additional profits when sorting the trash.

The paper considered that the most important is the fall of Sukleen, the Council for Development and Reconstruction and the government's plan to keep the trash in the streets to oblige all political and non-political parties to submit to their conditions.

The Armenian Revolutionary Federation's joining the Phalanges and other political activists, as well as municipalities affiliated with al-Morr, paved the way for seriously looking for alternative solutions, noting that the previous crisis led to the emergence of several new companies that collect trash from houses, and that are mostly involved with the municipals who are convinced that the trash would represent an additional income for them and huge side commissions.

Away from their inevitable later demand to stop transferring their allocations to Sukleen accounts, there is a decision among the Morr, Phalanges-affiliated municipalities to find urgent solutions. For his part, the Chief of the Keserwan Municipalities Union seems confident he is able to offer a typical solution.

A year ago, on the sidelines of the popular movement, he conducted all necessary interviews with those concerned by finding solutions for this issue, and the required meetings with several concerned municipals, and he will make his decision in this regard in the coming days, amid strict rejection to submitting to any usurpation, which eventually threatens Sukleen to lose at least half of the Mount Lebanon districts.

AL-JOMHOURIA:
Berri: Extending the Parliament's Rule "Impossible"

On the other side, Lebanon is still stuck in dealing with its crises, despite harboring hopes that the period before the cabinet session on Sept. 8 would be full of communications to change the Free Patriotic Movement's position, at a time during which Hizbullah threw the ball in the Future Movement's court, calling it for holding talks with the chief of the Free Patriotic Movement MP Michael Aoun.

Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, after receiving visitors Sunday, concluded that the FPM's position shows flexibility upon attending the cabinet sessions. "The government shall return to its sessions the next week after the PM returns from his vacation. I don't think there is something that would delay holding the sessions normally, especially as the boycotting proved useless," Berri added.

Asked about updates in his relationship with Aoun, Berri said: "There is nothing new in the relationship with Aoun; hence, it is still as it was before."

Would you suggest any initiative for solving the crisis on the occasion of absenting Imam Musa Sadr and his companions on Wednesday? Berri replied: "Am I a producer of initiatives to launch one of them every day?"

Berri however disagreed that electing a president won't happen in 2016: "I am responsible, in case they accepted the bundle I proposed, that the president would be elected before the end of the year."

Responding to some who are reporting that the parliament's rule would be extended, Berri said: "Unlike the atmosphere in some milieus that the parliament's rule would be extended, we say first, second... and eleventh, there is no extension for the parliament's rule under any title or condition, it is impossible, noting that the last extension was reluctant, and I, personally, didn't favor this option."

Source: Al-Ahed News