| Submit your comments on this article |
| Syria-Lebanon-Iran |
| Hezbollah rejects bid for UN control of Shaba Farms |
| 2008-06-12 |
| The leader of Hezbollah deputies in the Lebanese parliament, Mohammad Raad, rejected an initiative Wednesday to place the Shaba Farms area of the Golan Heights under the control of the United Nations. Raad told the Hezbollah-run al-Manar television channel that such a move would prevent the militant group from achieving its goal of wresting the area from Israeli control. The initiative to place the territory under the control of the UN was reportedly put forward by French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who visited Lebanon last week. Hezbollah officials told Sarkozy that the group wasn't opposed to a diplomatic solution to the Shaba Farms dispute -a departure from their traditional policy advocating force to return the disputed area- according to a report published in the London-based Arabic daily Al-Hayat on Monday. Newly elected Lebanese President Michel Suleiman said Monday that he would provide the world body with documents "that will prove the Shaba Farms belong to Lebanon." Israel captured the land in the 1967 Six-Day War and has refused to return it on the grounds that its status is ambiguous. According to the plan proposed to the UN, the Shaba Farms would be demarcated and returned to Lebanon at some future stage. |
| Posted by:Fred |