by Tom Perry and Laila Bassam
BEIRUT (Reuters) – Lebanese politician and Sunni camp leader Saad Hariri said on Monday he was suspending his role in politics and would not stand in the next legislative elections, an announcement that the effect of a bomb in a country still facing a serious economic crisis.
Saad Hariri, who served as Lebanon’s prime minister three times, also asked his party not to field candidates in the elections, citing several factors behind his decision, including Iranian influence – a reference to the Shia Hezbollah militia.
“I am convinced that there is no room for any positive opportunity for Lebanon in light of Iranian influence, international disarray, national division, bigotry and the collapse of the State,” he explained.
“We will continue to serve our people but our decision is to suspend any role in power, politics and in parliament,” Saad Hariri said in a televised address, his voice cracking with emotion as he spoke to the audience. a portrait of his father.
Saad Hariri succeeded his father, Rafik Hariri, after the latter’s assassination in 2005. While he remains a prominent Sunni figure in Lebanon, his political outlook has darkened in recent years, as the loss of Saudi support has weakened his position.
His withdrawal from the political scene comes in a context of economic collapse in Lebanon, which the World Bank has described as one of the most serious ever observed in the world.
Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati said on Monday that Saad Hariri’s decision constituted a “sad page for the country and for him personally”.
Druze community leader Walid Jumblatt also told Reuters that he was saddened by Saad Hariri’s decision, regretting that it leaves the field open “for Hezbollah and the Iranians”.
(Report Nayera Abdallah, Tom Perry and Laila Bassam; French version Dagmarah Mackos, edited by Blandine Hénault)