Lebanon could sink like the Titanic, warns parliament speaker

Nabih Berri calls for urgent action to form a government, as Parliament approves crisis funding to avert power blackout.

Lebanon’s influential parliamentary speaker Nabih Berri says the country will sink like the Titanic if it is not able to form a government as he opened a session to approve emergency funds to literally keep the lights on for two more months. “The whole country is in danger, the whole country is the Titanic,” Berri said on Monday. “It’s time we all woke up because in the end, if the ship sinks, there’ll be no one left.” Lebanon is in the throes of a financial crisis that poses the biggest threat to its stability since the 1975-1990 civil war. Without a new government, it cannot implement the reforms required to unlock desperately needed foreign aid.