"Lebanon will not be able to secure medicine or pay salaries in foreign currency, in the event that the monetary and economic plan presented by the Acting Governor of the Banque du Liban, Wassim Mansouri, is not approved," the caretaker prime minister said.
Comment: That's often how the IMF presents its offers: Accept the dodgy deal or risk total collapse.
"Mansouri's plan is consistent with the government's plans, and our goal is to approve these plans and not waste time because the goal is to save the country," he said.
In reference to consultations made recently between Mikati and the interim bank governor, the former said that there is "harmony [in the Central Bank] with the government's plans."
However, Lebanese media reported on 3 August that the Central Bank is considering completely halting its funding of the state as of Monday, 7 August.
Upon taking the reins of the Central Bank following the end of Riad Salameh's term last month, Mansouri said: "I will not sign on any expenditure for financing the government if it contravenes with my principles or the appropriate legal framework."
Days later, on 3 August, Lebanon's parliament failed to pass a law that would allow the state to borrow foreign currency from the Central Bank. Mansouri's condition for lending funds to the state from the Central Bank was the passing of the law, and the reimbursement of the funds "through a realistic plan," Naharnet reported.
The reforms that the caretaker prime minister referred to include capital controls, a bank restructuring law, and the 2023 state budget - which are all conditions imposed by the IMF for a bailout package.
Lebanon has been negotiating with the IMF in order to secure a bailout package to alleviate the severe economic crisis created by decades of corruption in the financial sector.
However, Washington, the IMF, and the World Bank have been accused of exploiting the country's economic crisis to exert political pressure on Lebanon.
As a result of the financial crisis Lebanon faces, the country's currency has lost 98 percent of its value, and the life savings of a majority of citizens have been wiped out.
Comment: Whilst Lebanon's economy has been on the precipice for many years, the number of countries that have recently appealed to the nefarious IMF for loans to save their ailing economies is rising - including Argentina, Turkey, and Sri Lanka - even the US, which still has the advantage of being able to rig vast swathes of the global financial markets recently suffered a credit downgrade; taken together, although there are signs of hope in the multipolar world alliances, the global economy is certainly due to hit a period of unprecedented instability: