Wednesday 2 December 2020
No Global Financial Support for Lebanon until Govt in Place
PARIS (Reuters) — France’s presidency said on Wednesday that there would be no international financial support for Lebanon until there was a government in place and warned that an audit of the central bank was more urgent than ever.
“To borrow or lend money you need trust and trust isn’t there”, a French presidential official said ahead of a video conference to assess the humanitarian situation. “We will stay like this as long as there is no credible government in place.”
A financial meltdown has crashed Lebanon’s currency, paralyzed banks, sent inflation soaring and increased poverty. Suggestions of a looming end to subsidies have triggered panic buying.
The French official said that no measures for a proposed French roadmap to help the country had been implemented. “The information we have is that the situation is getting worse and heading towards worse problems and that makes it even more necessary for a real audit [of the central bank]”, the official said.
He said world powers would continue to apply political pressure on Lebanese politicians, but gave no indication on how this pressure could manifest itself other than questioning the efficiency of recent U.S. sanctions that have targeted allies of Iranian-backed Hezbollah. “[The U.S. sanctions] have changed nothing on the ground. We need to continue to apply a public political pressure campaign, while supporting the population”, the official said.
Forum posts
AntonyL (2 December 2020, 19:57)
How do you expect a country that has no industry, no agriculture and relies exclusively on remittances from its nationals abroad and aid from the Gulf States to find its way out of the situation?
Farid Boluja (2 December 2020, 21:01)
The problem is the government and also the people. When you don’t have a strong man or a great leader how do you move on? Nobody wants to invest in their country which is so unsafe.