BEIRUT: The Cabinet is unlikely to meet before the end of this month – the deadline given to Lebanon to decide on the renewal of the cooperation protocol with the U.N.-backed Special Tribunal for Lebanon, parliamentary and political sources said Wednesday.

Lebanon must renew the cooperation protocol with the STL, which is probing the 2005 assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, before the end of February.

However, if Lebanon fails to renew the protocol in view of the sharp differences within the Cabinet over the STL, the U.N. Security Council will still uphold it as a valid document.

The Cabinet, which was split over Lebanon’s $32 million share to the tribunal’s funding, eventually had to pay the amount through the state-run Higher Relief Committee, thus averting a clash with Hezbollah and its March 8 allies which staunchly opposed the STL’s funding.

Prime Minister Najib Mikati’s decision last week to suspend the Cabinet’s sessions was viewed as a solution for the government to avert a clash among its members over the renewal of the STL’s protocol signed by the Lebanese state and the Security Council.

Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah ruled out Tuesday a government change, saying that contacts have been initiated with the aim of resolving the Cabinet crisis sparked last week following sharp differences between Mikati and ministers from MP Michel Aoun’s parliamentary bloc over the issue of civil service appointments.

Mikati has implicitly accused Aoun’s ministers of obstructing the Cabinet’s work, saying he will not allow anyone to undermine the prime minister’s prerogatives. Mikati has since said that he will not resume Cabinet sessions before agreement is reached on a formula to make the government productive.

Ministerial sources said that what has been leaked from this week’s meeting between Mikati and Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri indicated that Berri will not embark on a mediation effort, at least for now.

Nasrallah also said in his speech that there will be no mediation, rather contacts to resolve the Cabinet crisis. For his part, Aoun has said that he will not accept any mediation.

All this has confirmed fears that Mikati’s decision to suspend the Cabinet’s sessions was aimed at overcoming problems that were in fact “time bombs” that could bring down the government, the sources said.

Statements by Mikati that he would not resign or withdraw, the sources added, as well as Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblatt’s ruling out the Cabinet’s resignation and Aoun’s repeated declaration that his ministers would not resign, confirmed that once the issue of the STL’s protocol has been settled, there would be a solution to resume the Cabinet’s meetings.

The same sources expected the parties concerned with the Cabinet crisis to make concessions in order for the Cabinet to resume business.

With his move to suspend the Cabinet’s sessions, Mikati has aimed at proving his seriousness to the Sunni community in general, and his supporters in particular, that he will not undermine the institution of the Cabinet, the sources said.