Report: Hizbullah Says Ball is in Hariri’s Court

Lebanon’s government formation continues to stall as Hizbullah "puts the ball” in PM-designate Saad Hariri’s court saying “he should save his government” by allowing the representation of so-called independent Sunni MPs of March 8, al-Joumhouria daily reported on Monday.

“(Hizbullah chief) Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah has stressed in his speech that he won’t back down on supporting the representation demands of Sunni MPs. We believe the ball now is in Hariri’s court who should meet this opportunity and save his government,” Hizbullah sources told the daily on condition of anonymity.

Nasrallah threw his support behind the Sunni group on Saturday, insisting that they should be represented in the government.

For their part, sources of the March 14 camp said: “The latest remarks made by Nasrallah have proven that Hizbullah does not want a government to be formed because it wants to control the country’s decisions.”

They said the Sunni issue is a “heresy and some kind of political fraud that cannot be accepted. It is a clear attempt to blackmail the President (Michel Aoun) and Hariri in a bid to weaken him politically and morally,” they said.

They noted that said MPs already belong to other parliamentary blocs already had a share in the Cabinet.