The 13 MPs of the “change” bloc on Friday announced that they will launch a “comprehensive initiative” regarding the presidential election in early September.

“This initiative will include the political stances and the constitutional and values-related approach that would establish a political and popular incubator that would push for the election of a president who would contribute to launching a salvation course for the country,” they said in a statement.

Lebanon’s General Security agency has arrested Abdullah Yasser Sabawi, a grandson of Saddam Hussein’s half-brother Sabawi Ibrahim al-Tikriti, who is accused of involvement in the 2014 Camp Speicher massacre in Iraq.

“He is accused of carrying out criminal operations that resulted in the death of thousands of innocents, based on an Interpol warrant that has been enforced by the relevant Lebanese security agencies,” General Security chief Maj. Gen. Abbas Ibrahim told Iraq’s IMN TV.

Hezbollah MP Mohammad Raad has said that Hezbollah is "the real sovereign party" in Lebanon, a word usually used by Lebanese Forces chief Samir Geagea to describe the parties that oppose Hezbollah.

Many times, Geagea had called for a "sovereign" Prime Minister and a "sovereign" President and dubbed the opposition MPs as "sovereign." A sovereign President, for him, would be a President who can confront Hezbollah and its allies.

Caretaker Minister of the Displaced Issam Sharafeddine accused Friday Prime Minister-designate Najib Mikati of not wanting to repatriate the Syrian refugees.

"Mikati doesn't want to facilitate the repatriation of the refugees," Sharafeddine said, adding that he and Mikati are at odds because of many disagreements over economic issues, and not just because of the refugees case.

Free Patriotic Movement chief Jebran Bassil on Thursday accused political rivals of giving up Christian rights and said they “lost their mind” when he visited Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi to seek “consensus” over the next president.

“Without making a concession over representation, we have said that we might cede it to a person on whom we can agree to prevent (presidential) vacuum,” Bassil said in a video he posted on Twitter.

The Finance and Budget Committee, headed by MP Ibrahim Kanaan, convened Thursday to discuss the 2022 state budget law.

Kanaan asked the government to give realistic numbers for the so-called customs dollar that will determine the LBP to USD exchange rate to be used to calculate customs on imports.

Prime Minister-designate Najib Mikati told ministers in Tuesday’s meeting that he is “keen” on the formation of a new government, caretaker Health Minister Firass Abiad said on Thursday.

Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblat has slammed Free Patriotic chief Jebran Bassil, accusing him, along with President Michel Aoun, of obstructing reforms, especially in the energy sector.

Jumblat also criticized Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea and considered that Geagea has made it possible for Aoun to become President.

President Michel Aoun warned Wednesday that “the effort of some countries to integrate the displaced Syrians present in Lebanon into the Lebanese society is a crime that Lebanon will not accept no matter what happens.”

Aoun voiced his remarks in a Baabda meeting with Canadian International Development Minister Harjit S. Sajjan.

Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea stressed Wednesday that “an understanding or a settlement with the Axis of Defiance over the presidential file is rejected, because it will certainly lead to prolonging the crises that the country is suffering from.”

“The concerns and interests of Hezbollah contradict with the interests of Lebanon the state and the country,” Geagea added, in a meeting in Maarab with Swedish Ambassador to Lebanon Ann Dismorr.