Electing a president is seen as a crucial step in resolving Lebanon’s economic crisis, the worst since the 1975 Lebanese civil war.

The Quintet Committee on Lebanon met the country’s Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri in Beirut on Tuesday to discuss the latest political developments in the Lebanese presidential file, Doha’s foreign ministry said in a statement.

The meeting took place at the level of ambassadors, where Qatar’s ambassador to Lebanon Sheikh Saud bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani represented the Gulf state.

The group — Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the United States, and France — was formed last year under an initiative led by French Presidential Envoy for Lebanon Jean-Yves Le Drian.

The committee has since held regular meetings to break Beirut’s prolonged political deadlock, with the presidency seat still vacant after former president Michel Aoun left office in October 2022. 

The country has since failed to elect a president at least 12 times.

The group held their first meeting in Paris in February last year and met again in Doha on July 17, 2023. The committee in Doha had discussed “concrete options with respect to implementing measures against those who are blocking progress” in the election of a president.

The failure to elect a president is due to a deep political divide that widened after the 1975 Civil War. At the time, various Lebanese sides engaged in a bloody civil war that lasted for 15 years, ending with the help of the 1989 Taif Agreement, negotiated in Saudi Arabia at the time.

There have been several names on the table among Lebanese politicians, including Army Commander General Joseph Aoun, and Suleiman Frangieh, who is Hezbollah’s preferred candidate.

However, Qatar has repeatedly rejected claims over having a preferred candidate, stressing the president must be elected by the people.

Commenting on the latest meeting in Beirut, Egypt’s ambassador, Alaa Moussa, stressed the importance of achieving consensus over electing a president through dialogue, Lebanese media reported.

“The dialogue or discussions should lead to a consensus. A parliamentary session should be held with a full quorum,” Moussa said.

The parties at the meeting also noted that they will hold further discussions on Lebanon’s political deadlock.

Lebanon’s ongoing crises

Electing a president is seen as a crucial step in resolving Lebanon’s economic crisis, the worst since the 1975 Lebanese civil war. The 2020 Beirut Port Explosion coupled with the COVID-19 outbreak contributed to the country’s worst economic downfall.

To date, authorities have yet to hold any party to account for the deadly blast.

The Lebanese pound reached a record-low value in 2023, losing about 97 percent of its value to the U.S. dollar. 

The Lebanese population has long pointed to the ruling elite as being behind the country’s current state and protests since 2019 have called for political reform in Lebanon.

Reform has also been a demand made by the International Monetary Fund to provide Lebanon with a $3 billion aid package.

On March 25, Finma, Switzerland’s market regulator, found that Banque Audi (Suisse) — which belongs to Lebanon’s largest banking group, Bank Audi — was complicit in money laundering violations.

The investigation found that the bank “breached its obligations in the prevention of money laundering and thereby seriously violated financial market law.”

“The bank had inadequately clarified the origin of assets in high-risk client relationships. For example, a payment from a politically exposed person was made into the account of a high-ranked Lebanese official,” Finma said at the time.

The Swiss entity launched the probe in 2021 following corruption investigations into Riad Salameh, the former governor of Lebanon’s central bank.

Last year, Salameh faced an investigation in Lebanon, France as well as at least four other European countries over accusations of money laundering, embezzlement and bribery.

Salameh, who has denied all allegations of misconduct, was charged by prosecutors in Beirut in 2022 with embezzling more than $330mn in public funds.

A World Bank report released in August 2022 exposed how politicians in Lebanon were using the country’s resources to serve their own interests and accused officials of conducting a Ponzi scheme.

Meanwhile, southern Lebanon has been at the centre of escalations between Israel and Hezbollah, triggered by Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza on October 7, 2023.

Nearly seven months on, Israel has killed at least 340 people, including three journalists, in Lebanon while injuring hundreds of others, according to the Lebanese health ministry.

The first recorded killing of a press member was on October 13, when Israel killed Reuters reporter Issam Abdallah in a missile strike. The Lebanese journalist was among a group of seven international press members, which included Al Jazeera.

Numerous probes, including one by AFP, found that Israel knowingly and deliberately targeted the press crew.

Another Israeli airstrike on November 21 then killed Al Mayadeen’s correspondent, Farah Omar, alongside cameraman, Rabih Me’mari, in Tayr Harfa, South Lebanon.

In 2006, Israel waged a 34-day war on Lebanon, killing 1,200 mostly Lebanese civilians. The war ended with Hezbollah forcing Israeli soldiers out after weeks of intense attacks.

Concerns over the breakout of another war have been on the rise, with Israel repeatedly threatening to wage a war.