An International Monetary Fund (IMF) mission to Lebanon said it hoped its parliament would approve the draft 2019 state budget as soon as possible, the Lebanese finance ministry said in a statement. The head of the IMF mission, Chris Jarvis, hoped “parliament would as soon as possible approve the budget in which work happened to reduce the deficit to 7.6% (of GDP), which will help release funds that Lebanon needs from the Cedre conference,” said the finance ministry statement, which was issued in Arabic. Donor states and institutions pledged some $11 billion in financing to Lebanon at the Cedre conference in Paris last year, conditional on the country undertaking long-delayed reforms.