The Central Bank has issued a circular preventing banks from deducting new fees from bank accounts created prior to October 2019.

The Bank also asked commercial banks to disclose accurate information about the “real cost” and mechanism of any fees imposed on clients, warning that the Central Bank’s Banking Control Commission will oversee the implementation of the circular and will penalize any violating banks.

The wife of slain Lebanese Forces member Elias Hasrouni, Yvette Sleiman Hasrouni, has died of her wounds following a car crash, the National News Agency reported on Tuesday.

The woman, who hailed from the southern town of Ain Ebel, had been rushed to the Salah Ghandour Hospital in Bint Jbeil suffering a hemorrhage and requiring large quantities of blood, NNA said.

Kataeb leader Sami Gemayel accused Hezbollah of "hijacking the presidential juncture" after he met Tuesday with the ambassadors of Qatar and Egypt.

"Dialogue is not imposing a candidate in a fruitless meeting," Gemayel said, accusing Hezbollah of being the party refusing dialogue and solutions.

Hezbollah Secretary-General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah on Monday announced that “there is nothing clear or new in the near future” regarding the presidential file.

“The Qatari envoy is exerting daily efforts, there is nothing clear or new in the near future and we must wait to see more efforts in the presidential file,” Nasrallah said in a televised address.

The domestic and foreign efforts regarding the presidential file “have not achieved any progress towards exiting the crisis,” a senior Hezbollah official said on Monday.

Caretaker Minister of the Displaced Issam Sharafeddine has launched a vehement verbal attack on caretaker Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib over the Syrian refugee file.

“You talk a lot and I tolerated you last time, but what are you good for? You are subservient, gutless and complicit,” Sharafeddine added.

The Finance and Budget Parliamentary Committee convened Monday to discuss the legality of the government's spendings from the $1.139 billion in Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) disbursed by the International Monetary Fund.

The committee's head, MP Ibrahim Kanaan, said after the meeting that the committee has decided to refer the SDR file to the Audit Bureau, accusing the government of spending illegally from the SDR without the parliament's approval and supervision.

Lebanese Forces chief Samir Geagea on Monday acknowledged that the Syrian refugee crisis has become an “existential threat” for Lebanon, calling for measures by the government instead of “statements and political exploitation.”

“The Free Patriotic Movement and its allies don’t represent a mere majority in the government but rather the entire caretaker Cabinet, so why doesn’t this government convene and give clear and very specific executive orders to all the security agencies that are concerned with implementing the Lebanese laws?” Geagea wondered.

Caretaker Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib has said that both the West and Damascus are rejecting the return of Syrian refugees from Lebanon to the war-torn country.

Bou Habib, who is currently in Washington, spoke to al-Joumhouria newspaper about the steps that a ministerial committee will make to communicate with Syria over the return of the refugees. In addition to Bou Habib, the committee comprises General Security acting chief Maj. Gen. Elias Bayssari and Higher Defense Council chief Maj. Gen. Mohammed al-Mustafa.

Hezbollah central council member Sheikh Nabil Qaouq has noted that “there are foreign, international and domestic initiatives to resolve the presidential crisis but no progress towards a solution.”

“This is because the challenge and confrontation folk have torpedoed all these initiatives due to deep-rooted grudges and failed bets,” Qaouq said.