Geagea says new tenure's foreign policy to be 'balanced'

NNA - Lebanese Forces leader, Samir Geagea, told an interview with Orient News channel on Wednesday that the foreign policy devised by the new tenure would "balanced," noting the President Michel Aoun's first trip will be to Saudi Arabia. "There is undoubtedly a huge violation [of the foreign policy], which is Hezbollah's involvement in the Syrian war; still, Lebanon will espouse a balanced and serious foreign policy," Geagea said. "The first visit abroad for the President of the republic will be to Saudi Arabia and the Gulf; therefore, the foreign policy will be balanced." The LF chief also indicated that the state policy drafted by Prime Minister Saad Hariri's government does combine between President Aoun's inaugural speech and the policy of the former Cabinet. As to the upcoming legislative polls, Geagea maintained that contact channels were open among President Aoun, the LF, Future Movement, and the Progressive Socialist Party. He said that Hezbollah's odds to endorse its sought election law were at best slim--in reference to full proportionality--, while the hybrid voting system had better chances. Moreover, he clarified that the Cabinet will adopt the mechanism stated by the Constitution to take decisions inside the ministerial council. "Decisions are taken unanimously or consensually; when we can't reach unanimity, there must be vote." Separately, Geagea made it clear that his party neither agrees that Lebanese officials visit President Bashar al-Assad in Syria nor that he comes on a visit to Lebanon. "There is no existing state in Syria. Al-Assad is the head of the regime (...) he doesn't represent the state in Syria," he said. "We must wait for a Syrian state to exist to mull ties with it, but this does not apply now," he added. "It is not al-Assad who is ruling over Damascus but Iran and Russia, in addition to Turkey in northern Syria," he continued. Furthermore, Geagea said that the Lebanese did not support the settlement of the displaced Syrians in Lebanon, "but, at the same time, we are not with their return unless to a safe area." "Aleppo is one battle amid a big war; the war of changing the regime and the reality in Syria has kicked off and nobody can stop it. The Syrians might lose battles but they will never lose the war," he concluded.