We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again

Back in September 2005, this magazine published an article about the possibility of holding a donors’ conference in Beirut in December 2005. In the same article, the magazine expressed serious doubts as to the conference taking place in the medium-term, let alone in 2005. The main reasons for these doubts were built on the fact that as long as there were paramilitary organizations in Lebanon, and as long as the various UN resolutions (particularly 1559) were not implemented, a donors conference would remain a vivid fantasy. Indeed, it is becoming increasingly apparent that potential donors, led by the United States, are insisting that not a single penny will be disbursed to Lebanon as long as weapons are still held by organisations other than the Lebanese army, UN resolutions are not fully implemented, and economic reforms, particularly privatisation, are not put into practice. Donors have been burnt before in Lebanon with