BEIRUT (AFP) -- French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said Thursday he was cautiously optimistic of a breakthrough in Lebanon's political crisis which has threatened to scuttle a looming presidential election.

Kouchner, who was among several foreign envoys in Lebanon this week to encourage dialogue among the feuding political parties, said he was heartened by the fact that there appeared to be an opening between the Western-backed Cabinet and the opposition.
""Everyone stands to gain if Lebanon is sovereign and independent,"" Kouchner told Lebanese television after meeting both pro-opposition parliament speaker Nabih Berri and Prime Minister Fuad Siniora. ""I hope there won't be any major troubles before the Lebanese election.""
He said it was up to the Lebanese alone to work through the current standoff that marks the country's worst political crisis since the end of the 1975-1990 civil war.
""I am not asking all the Lebanese to love each other,"" he said. ""But the Lebanese need to understand that their future and the country's future lie in their hands.""
The opposition and the ruling majority have been at loggerheads for months and have failed to make any significant headway in agreeing on a consensus president to replace the current head of state Emile Lahoud whose term of office ends in November.
But in what many are interpreting as an opening, the ruling coalition said on Wednesday that it was not opposed to a proposal by Berri.
He said the opposition was ready to drop its demands for a government of national unity if all parties agree to choose a new president by consensus when Parliament convenes on September 25.
Kouchner said the ""positive"" gestures from the two sides gave him cause for hope.
""I have a feeling that things are going to work out,"" he said, although he added that the election might not take place on schedule.
Failure by the parties to choose a consensus candidate could spark a dangerous power vacuum or even the naming of two rival governments -- a grim reminder of the final years of the civil war when two competing administrations battled it out.
After his talks with Kouchner, Berri again warned that Lebanon faced ""disintegration"" and ""chaos"" if a new president is not elected.
He said the last-ditch compromise he had proposed had been welcomed by both UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and the Vatican.
Apart from Kouchner, other foreign envoys in Beirut this week have included U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Elizabeth Dibble and Sudanese presidential envoy Mohammad Othman Ismail. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Saltanov was due to meet Lebanese leaders on Friday.
Lebanese politicians have also traveled overseas in recent days, holding talks in Egypt, Germany, Italy and Saudi Arabia among other countries.
The resignation of six ministers from the Cabinet in November sparked the current political crisis, which has crippled the government's legislative agenda.