Nabih Berri (born January 28, 1938) is the speaker of the Lebanese National Assembly and a leader of his country's Shi'a Muslim population. He heads the mostly Shi'a Amal Party.
He was born in Sierra Leone to Lebanese parents. He went to school in Tibnin in southern Lebanon and later studied at Makassed and the Ecole de la Saesse in Beirut. He obtained a Law degree in 1963 from the Lebanese University, where he had served as the student body president. During the 1960s, he joined the Arab Nationalist Movement.
In the early 1970s he worked in Beirut as a lawyer for General Motors. He also lived in the Detroit-area from 1976 to 1978.
He held a series of positions in the Amal movement during the 1970, as a follower of Imam Moussa Al-Sadr , a Shi'a cleric who disappeared in mysterious circumstances while on a trip to Libya in 1978. This culminated in his assumption of full control in April 1980. He led the Amal movement during the fierce fighting of Lebanon's civil war. In 1984, he joined the National Unity government as Minister for Southern Reconstruction, and later, of Justice and of Electrical and Hydraulic Resources, under Prime Minister Rashid Karami. In this capacity, he played a key role in the negotiated release of the hostages following the hijacking of TWA Flight 847.
Berri again served as a Cabinet minister from 1989 to 1992, when he was elected Speaker of the National Assembly on November 20. The position of Speaker, which the Constitution reserves for a Shiite, is the highest governmental position a Shiite can obtain. He is viewed by many as a puppet of the Syrian government, and is a close ally of the pro-Syrian President, Émile Lahoud.
References