Saudi Arabia said on Monday it would be sending low-level representation to this week's Arab League summit in Damascus, confirming fears that an Arab rift over Lebanon could undermine the annual meeting.
The Saudi permanent representative at the Arab League said he would represent his country at the summit, meaning that influential King Abdullah and Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal would be staying away from the Damascus meeting.
Saudi Arabia blames Syria for the failure of Damascus-allied Lebanese opposition forces to reach a deal with the Lebanese government and end political deadlock which has prevented the election of a new president for four months.
"I will head Saudi Arabia's delegation to the summit," Ahmad bin Abdelaziz Qattan told reporters after a meeting of Arab League representatives in the Syrian capital. "We meet today without a president in Lebanon due to the continued and unjustifiable delays in the election. We look forward to an effective Syrian role in achieving a Lebanese national reconciliation," Qattan told the meeting.
Lebanon's political crisis was expected to hit the level of turnout at the March 29-30 summit. The Arab League expects no last-minute breakthrough in the political deadlock, the chief of the pan-Arab organisation said. "What we have not succeeded in building in the last several months I don't think we will succeed in doing in the next 24 hours," Amr Moussa told Reuters.
Lebanon's parliament speaker Nabih Berri indicated on Sunday he would put off for the 17th time a session, this time scheduled for Tuesday, to choose a president due to a lack of progress toward ending the political deadlock.
A delay would mean that there would be no Lebanese president to attend the March 29-30 Arab summit. Lebanon has been without a president since Emile Lahoud's term ended in November. Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit said turnout at an Arab summit could be poor if the session of the Lebanese parliament to select a president was again postponed.