Lebanon’s caretaker PM threatens to stop running gov`t

Hassan Diab, Lebanon's caretaker prime minister, threatened on Saturday to resign in order to put pressure on politicians to join a new government.

Diab said: “The equation is clear: there is no solution to the social crisis without solving the financial crisis, no solution to the financial crisis without the resumption of negotiations with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), no negotiations with the IMF without reforms, no reforms without a new government.”

Following the August 4 Beirut port explosion, which destroyed large swaths of the capital, Diab's cabinet resigned. Saad al-Hariri, the prime minister-designate, was nominated in October but has yet to form a new cabinet due to a political impasse with President Michel Aoun.

Since October 2019, when nationwide demonstrations demanding political and economic changes forced al-government Hariri's to resign, Lebanon has been mired in a devastating political and socioeconomic crisis.