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| - French President Emmanuel Macron on a visit Tuesday to disaster-hit Lebanon urged its embattled leaders to grab a "last chance" for political reform, promising to return in December to follow up on progress. Macron was in Beirut for a second time since the August 4 blast there killed more than 180 people, laid waste to entire city districts and fuelled popular rage against the country's entire political elite. He came to attend muted celebrations marking the centenary of Greater Lebanon, and as political leaders settled on a new prime minister, Mustapha Adib, tasked with leading the country out of political turmoil and a painful economic crisis. Macron set an ambitious goal for his return visit -- to push for deep change, but without being seen as a meddler in the former French mandate. "This is the last chance for the Lebanese system," he warned. "It's a risky bet I'm making, I am aware of it... I am putting the only thing I have on the table: my political capital," he told Politico. The French leader arrived Monday, just hours after Adib, a little known 48-year-old academic and former ambassador to Germany, was designated prime minister. Macron, who has described his stance towards Lebanon's political establishment as "demanding without interfering", said it was not his place to "approve" of Adib's designation. Adib, whom he met late Monday and again Tuesday, "has to be given all the tools to succeed... so he can implement reforms," which have been long demanded by the international community, Macron said. Macron had kicked off his trip not by visiting political leaders, but by spending more than an hour Monday with singing legend Fairuz, who at 85 is a rare unifying figure in Lebanon. On Tuesday he attended a series of events to mark 100 years since French mandate authorities proclaimed the creation of Greater Lebanon. In the Jaj forest northeast of Beirut, he planted a cedar tree -- Lebanon's national symbol -- to express "confidence in the future of the country," his office said. Macron also returned for a second visit to Beirut port, ground zero of the colossal blast. He oversaw aid distribution from a French helicopter carrier and met French soldiers working with the Lebanese army to clear thousands of tonnes of debris. The French air force jets flew overhead, leaving trails of red, white and green smoke, the colours of the Lebanese flag. Some on social media criticised the aerial manoeuvre, saying it could trigger traumatic memories among people who experienced the port blast and the 1975-1990 civil war. The Beirut explosion compounded Lebanon's worst economic crisis since the war, with a UN agency warning that more than half of the population risk food shortages by the end of the year. On August 9, the international community pledged over 250 million euros (around $300 million) in emergency aid during a video conference jointly organised by France and the United Nations. Macron said he was ready to host a second Lebanon aid conference next month. The French president also met other political leaders, who are collectively blamed for the explosion of a stockpile of ammonium nitrate fertiliser that had languished in the port for years. The protest camp has already rejected the choice of Adib as premier, charging that he is too close to established political circles. Dozens of protesters gathered in central Beirut on Tuesday to demonstrate against their reviled leadership and to call for the proclamation of a secular state, to replace the multi-confessional country's sectarian power sharing system. "We proclaim the birth of a new Lebanon," read one poster at the rally. Macron, after meeting President Michel Aoun, was to gather with representatives of the country's top nine political blocs in the second such talks since the blast disaster. Representatives of the powerful Shiite Muslim Hezbollah movement, designated by the US as a terrorist group, were to be among those meeting Macron. The French president said this was necessary as Hezbollah is part of the Lebanese political system and excluding it "would be a mistake". bur-jri/ho/fz
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