France slams Lebanon leaders, warns of upcoming sanctions
France respects its promises, unlike Lebanese authorities that did not implement reforms. Things cannot continue this way, says French foreign trade minister during his visit to Beirut port
A French cabinet minister criticised Lebanese leaders on Tuesday, warning them of upcoming sanctions from Paris that will target Lebanese officials blocking the formation of a new government.
The remarks by France’s Foreign Trade Minister Franck Riester came during a visit to Beirut’s port, devastated in a massive explosion in August last year.
Reister said members of the political elite in Lebanon failed to respect their declared commitment to reforms and warned of a first wave of sanctions by France, Lebanon’s colonial ruler. He did not say whether the measures will be imposed only by France or perhaps by the European Union as well.
“France respects its promises, unlike Lebanese authorities that did not implement reforms,” Riester told reporters, standing amid the ruins in the port. “Things cannot continue this way.”
Lebanon is going through an unprecedented economic and financial crisis, made worse by a political deadlock that’s let the tiny Mideast country without a fully functioning government since August.
French President Emmanuel Macron visited Beirut twice since the port blast, pressing Lebanese politicians to implement reforms in order to release international investments and loans worth billions of dollars.
Repeated promises of reforms by Lebanon’s political elite, which has run the country since the end of the 15-year civil war in 1990, never materialised. The ruling class, including some former warlords, has been blamed for decades of corruption and mismanagement that have brought Lebanon to near-bankruptcy.
Lebanese Prime Minister Hassan Diab’s government resigned days ater hundreds of tonnes of ammonium nitrate, a highly explosive material used in fertilisers that had been improperly stored in the port for years, exploded on Aug.4, killing 211 people. It also injured more than 6,000 and damaged entire neighbourhoods of Beirut.
Riester later briefed President Michel Aoun on French aid to Lebanon since the blast, according to the president’s office. Ater the meeting, Riester tweeted that almost a year ago Lebanese political leaders pledged before Macron “to form a government and reform their country to stem the collapse.”
“Nothing was done,” he said. “This blockage is suicidal.”
As Lebanon’s economy tanks, foreign envoys are resorting to increasingly undiplomatic language to make clear their exasperation with politicians who demand bailout cash without delivering basic reforms in return.
Donors have conditioned any financial aid to the Mediterranean country on the establishment of a new government to enact urgently needed reforms that would tackle endemic grat.
But while Lebanese citizens slide further into poverty, politicians remain unable to agree on a new government line-up, nearly a year on from a deadly port explosion that forced the last one to resign.
“There’s great frustration with the Lebanese political class, because it’s incapable of placing the common good above its personal interests,” a French diplomatic source said.
As political parties squabble over ministerial porfolios, the Lebanese pound has plunged, lately trading on the black market at less than a tenth of its official value.
Bread has become more expensive and petrol scarce, while at home and work Lebanese swelter during increasingly long power cuts.
Supplies of some drugs have run low and the cash-strapped state can barely buy enough fuel to keep the nation’s power on, respectively leaving charities and private backup generators struggling to fill the gap.
The French diplomatic source said the international community was ready to help Lebanon.
But “sadly we can’t because, opposite us, we have no one to talk to, or we do but they don’t have the means — or the willingness — to act.”
Foreign donors have over the past year pledged millions of dollars in humanitarian aid to the Lebanese people, including at two conferences organised by France.
But, said the French source, “we’re not going to provide the Lebanese state with a blank cheque.”
A high-ranking UN official said a third donor conference this month would be the chance to sound the alarm over the “humanitarian consequences” of the political paralysis.