DAMASCUS: Syria and Lebanon decided yesterday to boost border controls and anti-terrorism coordination, as the two neighbors took a new step to strengthen ties since diplomatic relations were established.
The decision came during the first visit to Damascus by a Lebanese interior minister since the 2005 assassination of Lebanon’s five-time former premier Rafik Hariri.
Syrian Interior Minister Bassam Abdul Majid in talks with his Lebanese counterpart Ziad Baroud agreed to set up a commission “to put into place the basis of coordination in the fight against terrorism and crime.” According to a statement read out to reporters after their meeting, the commission would also be tasked with establishing a joint mechanism to police the border.
Baroud was accompanied by Lebanese security chiefs Wafiq Jizzini and Ashraf Rifi.
The visit comes almost three months after Lebanese President Michel Sleiman made a landmark visit to Damascus and less than a month after Syria and Lebanon decided to establish diplomatic relations for the first time.
Cross-border smuggling was set to figure high on the agenda of Baroud’s talks, after Syria deployed reinforcements along its border with Lebanon in what it terms an anti-smuggling operation.
Abdul Majid and Baroud discussed means to boost links between their ministries and the two countries’ security services.
The two ministers also reviewed the “confessions” broadcast by Syrian state television last week by alleged Fatah Al-Islam fighters for a deadly Sept. 27 car bombing in Damascus.
Meanwhile, in another development, Lebanese authorities have arrested five militants suspected of involvement in attacks in Syria and Lebanon and of belonging to an Al-Qaeda-inspired group, security sources said yesterday.
The Lebanese army confirmed in a statement it had detained five people who “are involved in terrorist acts.”
Army troops and security men made the arrests in the past four days in the northern city of Tripoli and the nearby Palestinian refugee camp of Beddawi. They coordinated with the Palestinian Fatah faction, which captured and handed over a suspect in the southern camp of Ain Al-Hilweh, the sources said.
All the militants are said to belong to Fatah Al-Islam, a group crushed by the army last year in a 15-week battle in the Nahr Al-Bared refugee camp in northern Lebanon.
