BEIRUT: Prime Minister Najib Mikati, on an official visit to France, said Saturday Paris would reduce its peacekeeper numbers in the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) and voiced optimism that the government crisis back home would be resolved.

Mikati also said the issue of renewing the protocol for the Special Tribunal for Lebanon was a matter for U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon following consultation with the Lebanese government.

“Foreign Affairs Minister Alain Juppe informed me that there would be a reduction in the number of French troops working in the south but that this decision was not a political one but rather a cost-cutting measure,” Mikati told a group of journalists the French capital.

Mikati, who is on a two-day official visit to Paris, said that during his talks with Juppe he had renewed his condemnation of last year’s attacks against UNIFIL, particularly two roadside bombs that targeted French peacekeepers.

Five French peacekeepers were wounded in a roadside bomb in the southern coastal city of Tyre on Dec. 9, four months after a roadside bomb in the southern city of Sidon wounded five French troops.

The prime minister also touched on the Cabinet crisis in Lebanon, saying that a resolution to the crisis, sparked over a row between him and ministers loyal to Free Patriotic Movement head MP Michel Aoun over administrative appointments, would eventually be reached.

“In the end, we will reach a particular solution and my desire is to get back to productive Cabinet sessions and for these sessions not be merely in form only,” Mikati said.

“And I think things will work properly,” he added.

Mikati has said that he will resume Cabinet sessions only if parties agree on a mechanism for a productive government.

Asked how Lebanon would be able to dissociate itself from regional events, particularly in neighboring Syria, Mikati said his main goal was to maintain stability in his country and strengthen its “immunity” to prevent any crises.

“Lebanon cannot move beyond the reality it finds itself in. We are certainly committed to our excellent relationship with Arab countries and we respect Saudi king's position,” Mikati said, referring to Saudi King Abdullah's comments Friday over the crisis in Syria.

Abdullah Friday slammed vetoes by Russia and China on an Arab and Western-backed resolution put forward at the U.N. Security Council aimed at ending the bloodshed in Syria. The Saudi king described the move by Moscow and Beijing as “unfavorable” and that it had shaken the confidence in the international body.

During his meeting with Juppe, Mikati said he had also expressed his concerns over the increasing presence of Syrian refugees in north Lebanon.

“We [Juppe and I] spoke about the case of Syrian refugees in Lebanon and we are offering the necessary assistance,” Mikati said, adding however that Lebanon could only support a limited number given its “sensitivities.”

“I fear the arrival of hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees that Lebanon would not be able to cope with,” he said.

According to U.N. estimates, that there are currently 5,238 refugees, constituting 976 families, registered in the north with the United Nations Higher Commissioner for Refugees and with the Lebanese High Relief Committee, the highest number since an initial influx of over 5,000 last April, which later fell as many refugees returned to Syria.

Lebanon is also home for more than 200,000 Palestinian refugees spread in several refugee camps across the country.

On the subject of the renewal of the protocol of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, which in June indicted four members of Hezbollah in the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, Mikati told reporters the issue was a matter for U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to decide following consultations with the Lebanese government.