BEIRUT, 16 April 2006 — Lebanon’s prime minister said yesterday he would ask US President George W. Bush next week to put pressure on Israel to pull out of a border strip to enable his government to extend its authority over all Lebanese land. Fouad Siniora, a member of Lebanon’s anti-Syrian majority coalition, will meet Bush in Washington on Tuesday. He is expected to hold talks with other US officials before meeting UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan in New York.
“We would expect the United States to extend its real support to Lebanon and this would help Lebanon to re-emphasize and reconfirm its sovereignty and its independence,” Siniora told Reuters in an interview at his office in central Beirut. “This would allow the government to maintain its role in the region as a beacon of democracy.”
Lebanon says the Israeli-occupied border area of Shebaa Farms is Lebanese territory and Israel’s 2000 pullout from south Lebanon was incomplete — a claim that has allowed Hezbollah resistance fighters to continue to launch sporadic attacks on Israeli forces there.
Israel and the United Nations say Shebaa is Syrian. Siniora said he would push through Beirut’s claim that it was Lebanese during his talks in Washington and New York. “I’m going to present to President Bush our case... Israel has to withdraw from the Shebaa Farms and has to stop violating our airspace and water,” the prime minister said.
This was essential if the Lebanese government was “to become the sole monopoly of holding weapons in the country” and would help Lebanese reach a consensus on how to defend their country, he said. The United States played a pivotal role in pushing Syria into withdrawing from Lebanon a year ago, two months after the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.
Washington has repeatedly expressed support for Siniora’s government, formed last year after the anti-Syrian coalition won the first general election in 30 years without direct Syrian meddling. But in recent months the anti-Syrian forces in Lebanon appeared to be on the back foot with international attention diverted to rising tension over developments in Iraq and Iran.
