Lebanon’s caretaker Foreign Minister Charbel Wehbe said on Wednesday that he was stepping down over a row that began after he suggested in televised remarks that the Arab Gulf countries, which are Lebanon’s major donors, support the Islamic State.
“In light of recent developments and the circumstances that accompanied the interview I gave to one of the TV stations … I had the honour to meet with President [Michel Aoun] and submitted to him a request to be exempted from my duties and responsibilities as minister of foreign affairs,” Lebanon’s state news agency NNA quoted Wehbe as saying.
In an interview on Monday with the US-based Arabic-language satellite broadcaster al-Hurra, Wehbe blamed Gulf states, without naming them, for bringing the Islamic State terrorist group to the region, particularly Iraq and neighbouring Syria.
His remarks triggered an uproar in Lebanon and the Gulf countries, prompting Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to summon the Lebanese ambassadors to protest against the foreign minister’s claim.
During the same show, Wehbe also told a Saudi guest that he would not answer to a “Bedouin,” in a derogatory reference to nomadic Arab tribes, who have inhabited the Arabian Peninsula.
The remarks by Wehbe, who was earlier picked for the post by Aoun, a close ally of Lebanon’s pro-Iran Hezbollah movement, also prompted the Lebanese presidency to issue a statement saying that what the foreign minister said in the interview was “his personal opinion.”
GNA
