Speaker Nabih Berri met on Sunday in Amman with Jordanian King Abdullah on the sidelines of the 29th Conference of the Arab Inter-Parliamentary Union (APU), where discussions touched on a number of issues including Jordan’s willingness to exchange water for electricity with Lebanon, the National News Agency reported Monday.
The two men discussed a joint Lebanese-Jordanian concern regarding the presence of Syrian refugees on their soil and the pressures it poses on both countries.
They stressed the need for finding a solution for the refugee crisis taking into consideration the “humanitarian dimension, which requires the return of displaced persons to their country as soon as possible.”
Both men had similar positions regarding the need for coordination between Lebanon and Syria and between Jordan and Syria on the return of refugees.
Bilateral talks also tackled a number of issues related to mutual relations and cooperation between Lebanon and Jordan in particular, and Arab-Arab relations in general.
On the Lebanese-Jordanian relations, Berri highlighted Lebanon’s longtime electricity crisis, to which the Jordanian king expressed readiness to provide Lebanon with electricity in exchange for water.
King Abdullah said Jordan has an electricity surplus. Berri, in turn, pointed to Lebanon’s surplus water capacity, questioning about the cost of electricity if Lebanon wished to benefit from it, to which the Jordanian King replied: “We welcome this, so you have surplus water and we can exchange electricity for water with you.”
http://www.naharnet.com/stories/en/257180-jordan-willing-to-exchange-lebanese-water-for-electricity