Premier Fouad Siniora said Saturday he would refer a bill creating the international tribunal to Parliament for ratification after the forthcoming Arab Summit Conference in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Siniora, in an interview with al-Arabiya satellite television network, said he had informed Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa of the decision to refer the bill to Parliament after Speaker Nabih Berri said Tuesday that he cannot summon the house to deliberate the issue because he has not received the bill.Siniora said Moussa, who had been mediating in the Lebanese conflict for nearly two months, "had asked me to delay referring the bill to Parliament" to give Berri time to work out differences between the Hizbullah-led opposition and the Majority, represented by MP Saad Hariri. "However, after hearing what Speaker Berri has said, I called Secretary General Moussa and informed him that the commitment I gave him is no more binding and I will refer the bill to Parliament."
"We should exert maximum effort to ratify the tribunal's bill at Parliament, we have an interest in that," Siniora said.
What if Lebanon failed to deliberate the tribunal's bill at parliament, Siniora was asked. Would it be created by the U.N. Security Council under chapter seven of the international organization's charter? He replied: "let's put aside any reference to chapter seven for now, and let's realize that the world insists, like we insist, on implementing security council resolutions."