BEIRUT (AP) – Lebanon’s president arrived in Qatar Monday for talks on a diplomatic crisis between Beirut and oil-rich Persian Gulf nations.
President Michel Aoun’s face-to-face meetings with the emir of Qatar and other Qatari officials come as Lebanon is in an economic crisis, the worst in its modern history.
Aoun is expected to discuss the tense relations between Lebanon and the Arab nations led by Saudi Arabia during his meetings in Doha.
Saudi Arabia withdrew its ambassador from Beirut and asked the Lebanese envoy to leave last month following televised comments by George Kordahi, Lebanon’s information minister. Kordahi said the war in Yemen was futile and called it an aggression by the Saudi-led coalition.
Saudi Arabia, backed by the U.S. and other key Western powers, launched the war on Yemen in March 2015, with the goal of bringing former president Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi’s government back to power and crushing the popular Ansarullah resistance movement.
Aoun told Qatar’s Al-Raya daily that in face-to-face meetings, he will call on the country’s emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, to invest in the reconstruction of Beirut’s port that was destroyed last year in a massive blast. Aoun also said he would seek an investment in other infrastructure projects, including electricity, that is cut for much of the day in Lebanon.