PSP chief questions Iraq’s Sadr visit to Beirut
The Daily Star
BEIRUT: Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblatt Friday
questioned the visit of Prominent Iraqi Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr to
Beirut in a series of tweets.
Jumblatt, who is known for his sarcastic posts on social media,
welcomed Sadr to Lebanon but wondered what the real motives behind his
visit to Lebanon were.
“
I wonder what he has up his sleeve,” the PSP chief said.
In several other remarks via Twitter, Jumblatt asked if authorities
in Baghdad had uncovered illegal internet networks or if they were
seeking Lebanon’s help to combat booby-trapped vehicles.
Telecoms Minister Boutros Harb announced last month that several
illegal internet providers were operating in the country, and warned
that they posed a national security threat because they made it easy for
Israel to spy on Lebanon.
Several people have so far been charged in the case, some of whom are in custody.
Sadr reportedly arrived in Beirut Sunday in a discreet visit, An-Nahar newspaper quoted sources as saying.
The nature of his trip remains unclear. However, the daily said Friday that the
Shiite cleric is in Lebanon on a routine visit.
The sources added that Sadr’s visit to Lebanon doesn’t include any exceptional meeting.
Sky News Arabia reported Thursday that Sadr’s trip coincided with
that of Iraq’s former Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and the official
representative of Iraq’s top Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Sistani,
Sayyid Jawad al-Shahristani.
Iraq has been gripped by a political crisis with Iraqi lawmakers
voting Thursday to remove the parliament speaker and his deputies from
office, increasing the turmoil as the country battles extremists and
struggles with financial setbacks.
Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi had called in February for
“fundamental” changes to the cabinet so that it included “professional
and technocratic figures and academics.”
A months-long saga ensued, in which Abadi proposed various reforms
that parties and politicians with interests in the existing system have
sought to delay or undermine.
Sadr later took up the demand for a technocratic government,
organizing a two-week sit-in, putting Abadi under pressure to act, but
also supporting the course of action he wanted to take.
Sadr relented after Abadi
presented his first list of nominees at the end of March, but has yet to
react to the most recent developments in efforts to replace the
cabinet.
