ShareBEIRUT: The Lebanese government is ready to fully implement a UN resolution stipulating the complete disarmament of south Lebanon as part of a ceasefire agreement with the Zionist entity, caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati said.
Mikati said Lebanon was ready to fully implement UN Security Council Resolution 1701 and deploy the army south of the Litani River, which lies about 30 km (around 20 miles) from Lebanon’s southern border.
Mikati also said he and House Speaker Nabih Berri had agreed that electing a new president to end a near two-year vacancy at the top post would only happen after a ceasefire took hold, in comments delivered after the pair met in Beirut.
Zionist military forces have launched a barrage of strikes in two weeks across Lebanon which they say were targeting Hezbollah targets with the goal of “eliminating” several commanders. The possibility that the Zionist military’s next move might be to send ground troops and tanks over the border is on many minds.
More than 1,000 Lebanese have been killed and 6,000 wounded in the past two weeks, according to official figures released by the Lebanese Health Ministry. One million people - a fifth of the population - have fled their homes, the government says.
“We in Lebanon are ready to implement 1701, and immediately upon the implementation of the ceasefire, Lebanon is ready to send the Lebanese army to the area south of the Litani River and to carry out its full duties,” in coordination with UN peacemakers, Mikati said. He said parliament would then convene to elect a consensus president.
UNSC 1701 ended the month-long 2006 war between Hezbollah and the Zionist entity and called for a full of withdrawal of Zionist military troops from southern Lebanon and that the Lebanese army and UN peacekeepers be the only armed force south of the Litani River.
100,000 people
The ongoing attacks have forced some 100,000 people to flee to Syria from Lebanon due, a figure that has doubled in two days, the United Nations’ refugee head said on Monday. “The number of people who have crossed into Syria from Lebanon fleeing Zionist airstrikes - Lebanese and Syrian nationals - has reached 100,000,” Filippo Grandi said on X. “The outflow continues,” he warned.
He said his UN refugee agency (UNHCR) was “present at four crossing points, alongside local authorities and (the Syrian Red Crescent) to support new arrivals”. The mass displacement into war-torn Syria began a week ago, on September 23, the UNHCR told AFP on Saturday.
In the last week, the Zionist military’s bombardment has killed more than 700 people in Lebanon, including 14 paramedics over a two-day period, according to Lebanon’s health ministry. By Friday, 30,000 people had crossed into Syria, according to the UNHCR. Its representative in Syria, Gonzalo Vargas Llosa, said around 80 percent were Syrian nationals and 20 percent Lebanese.
“Most are women and children, although some males have crossed. About half are children and adolescents,” he told reporters. He stressed the fleeing people were “arriving in a country that has been suffering from its own crisis and violence for more than 13 years, as well as from economic collapse”. “People fleeing the bombing arrive in Syria exhausted, traumatized and in desperate need of help.”
‘Great concern’
Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia expressed its “great concern” at the Zionist attacks in Lebanon on Monday, calling for the country’s “sovereignty and territorial integrity” to be respected. A foreign ministry statement said: “the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is following with great concern the developments taking place in the Republic of Lebanon.” As the country’s health ministry said more than a hundred people had been killed in Zionist military strikes on targets across the country on Sunday, Riyadh stressed the need to respect Lebanon’s sovereignty.
“The Kingdom calls on the international community to assume its responsibilities towards protecting regional peace and security to spare the region and its people the dangers and tragedies of wars,” it added. There have been growing calls internationally for the Zionist entity to stop its aggression as it prepares for a possible ground offensive in Lebanon, amid fears of all-out war in the Middle East. — Reuters
