LEBANON: UN envoys meet Siniora, other ministers to discuss troop deployment

UN envoys Terje Roed-Larsen and Vijay Nambiar met with Prime Minister Fouad Siniora and other top Lebanese officials on Saturday (August 19) to discuss a UN brokered truce. The Lebanese Defence Minister said he might seek to halt the deployment of troops to the south if the United Nations did not clarify its position on an Israeli raid in the Bekaa Valley. Defence Minister Elias al-Murr was among the officials in the meeting, which also included Interior Minister Ahmad Fatfat and army chief Michel Suleiman. The United Nations has so far taken no stance on the raid. In a statement on Saturday, it said it was not in a position to do so because its troops were in the south of the country, not the eastern Bekaa Valley where the raid took place. Lebanon's prime minister earlier described the raid as a "naked violation" of the UN-backed truce that this week halted Israel's 34-day war with the Shi'ite Muslim group the Hizbollah. The UN resolution adopted on August 11 ordered Israel to end "all offensive military actions" and Hizbollah to end all attacks. It also called for an embargo on arms supplies not authorised by the Lebanese government and for the deployment of the Lebanese army in the south alongside a strengthened UNIFIL, the UN peacekeeping force in the area.

ITN Source | August 20, 2006

Tags:. .united. .meeting. .because. .place. .actions