Friday, August 11, 2006
THREE CHEERS FOR NOT BEING COMPLETE MORONS!!!
Israeli Leader Backs Deal Set for Approval by U.N. Council
UNITED NATIONS, Aug. 11 — Ambassadors negotiating a resolution to halt the fighting in Lebanon reported agreement on a final text today and predicted a vote on it by evening.
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John Bolton, United States Ambassador to the United Nations, discussed the proposed resolution to halt the fighting in Lebanon.
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“We are now very, very close to agreement and our aspiration to have a vote at the end of the afternoon remains,” said John R. Bolton, the American ambassador.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrived at the United Nations this morning saying she expected final action on the resolution within hours. Other foreign ministers, including France’s Philippe Douste-Blazy and Britain’s Margaret Beckett, were also expected to participate in a vote.
In Jerusalem, Israeli officials said today that Prime Minister Ehud Olmert had accepted the deal and informed the United States of his decision, according to the Associated Press. Mr. Olmert will recommend that his government approve the deal in its Sunday meeting, said Gideon Meir, a senior official in the Israeli Foreign Ministry.
But the Associated Press also reported that an Israeli official said the government’s offensive against Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon would continue at least until Sunday’s Cabinet vote.
Ambassadors had been upbeat Thursday about settling the disputes over the text, which have consumed a week of intensive negotiations, but Thursday evening the accord was set back by objections from Lebanon over the nature of the international force that is to be sent into South Lebanon once the truce is declared.
Lebanon opposed the invocation in the text of Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter, which gives peacekeepers the right to use broad military firepower. The United States and Israel believe that the international force that goes into south Lebanon must be strong enough to prevent Hezbollah from reoccupying the area.
Mr. Bolton and his French counterpart, Jean-Marc de la Sabliére, had worked into the night to adjust the language before sending a revised version overnight to Beirut.
Nassir Al-Nasser, the ambassador of Qatar, the Arab representative on the Council, said that the revised language shifts the emphasis to Chapter VI. That chapter sets up procedures for peaceful settlement of conflict before the kind of military enforcement envisioned in Chapter VII is resorted to.
It was not clear whether the final text, which Mr. Al-Nasser said was still undergoing last-minute changes, would use the Chapter VII designation for the 20,000-member stabilization force that is ultimately to take responsibility for the area.
That force is expected to be led by France and to include troops from other European countries. Both Britain and the United States have said they will offer logistical support, but no soldiers.
Mr. Al-Nasser indicated that the Lebanese were now supportive and a vote would occur later today.
The original French-American draft, introduced last Saturday left the creation of that force to a second resolution, which would also be responsible for setting up the disarmament of Hezbollah, demarcating the borders of Lebanon, establishing an arms embargo to prevent the entry of unauthorized weapons and empowering the Lebanese army to control all its territory.
Hezbollah would be expected to pull out of all areas south of the Litani River, which is roughly 15 miles from the border with Israeli.
The final text works off a formula that would have the Israelis depart in phases while the Lebanese Army, along with a reinforced Unifil, the United Nations force in Lebanon, moved progressively into the area. Fouad Siniora, the Lebanese prime minister, said Monday that he was sending 15,000 members of his military to southern Lebanon.
The phased withdrawal and deployment approach was an essential compromise after Lebanon and the 22-member Arab League early this week objected to the first French-American draft that would have permitted the Israeli military to remain in South Lebanon.
The text called for an immediate cessation of “all attacks” by Hezbollah but only of “all offensive military operations” by Israel. Since Israel has classed its war effort as one taken in self-defense, Lebanon said this amounted to a ceasefire against only one side, Hezbollah, and demanded that Israel be ordered to withdraw immediately behind the existing border.
Hezbollah had reacted by saying it would agree to no ceasefire as long as Israeli solders remained in Lebanon.
Israel has little respect for Unifil, but Dan Gillerman, the Israeli ambassador, went on Israel’s Channel 1 Thursday to reassure Israelis that the enhanced Unifil would be “completely different from the blue helmets we know today.”
The agreement brings to an end a four-week period in which the Security Council has been excoriated, particularly throughout the Middle East, for having taken no significant action to stop the fighting.
Secretary General Kofi Annan, who has been among those criticizing the Council, said today, “I think we’ve had enough discussions, the issues have been discussed all around and it is time for decision, and I hope the Council will take firm action today.”
“Each day that the discussions go on, the death, the killings and the destruction continues in the region, and civilians on both sides continue to suffer,” he said.
Lost in the rush of diplomatic activity today was a resolution introduced Thursday night by Russia calling for a 72-hour “humanitarian ceasefire” to enable aid workers to reach the thousands of wounded, ill and hungry in Lebanon cut off from international assistance.
Vitaly I. Churkin, the Russian ambassador, said he was taking the action because his country had lost patience with the slow pace of diplomacy at a time when people were dying in large numbers and military forces and militias were threatening to escalate their activity.
He said, however, that Moscow would withdraw the measure if it appeared that the French-American draft could come to a vote.
# posted by Brian @ 6:00 PM 
