BEIRUT, Lebanon France, saying its peacekeeping mission inBeirut has become impossible, withdrew its 45 cease-fire observersyesterday in a move that marked the end of Western peacekeepingefforts in the battered capital.
Also yesterday, American University of Beirut sources said twoBritish teachers at the university are missing and feared kidnapped.
The missing men were identified as Leigh Douglas, 34, apolitical science professor, and Philip Hatfield, 35, director of theuniversity's language school.
The university sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity,said the men were last seen Friday night at a night spot in Moslemwest Beirut. No group has claimed to have kidnapped any Britons inLebanon in the last few days.
The French pullout after two years on the Green Line dividingthe Moslem and Christian sectors came two weeks after kidnappers offour Frenchmen demanded it and three weeks after a sniper killed aFrench observer, the seventh to die in Lebanon.
It also coincided with sporadic clashes and sniper fire betweenMoslem and Christian forces on the Green Line, and betweenPalestinian and Shiite Moslem gunmen in two Palestinian refugee campson the southern outskirts of Beirut.
The departure of the French went without incident. No date wasgiven for their evacuation from the country.
The French observers were the last Western truce force inBeirut, but about 38,000 foreign soldiers or fighters remain in thewar-wracked country, including United Nations peacekeepers.
"These observers accomplished, for two years, at the price ofgreat sacrifice, a useful action appreciated by all parties," said aFrench Foreign Ministry statement. "(But) the way the situation hasevolved no longer allows them to fulfill the mission they were givenand that is why it was decided to end it."
Lebanese government sources said Paris decided on the withdrawalbecause there were no signs of a comprehensive cease-fire and becausethe observers were increasingly being targeted by Moslemfundamentalists in west Beirut.
The French ministry statement made no mention of the 1,400French soldiers in the 5,500-man UN peacekeeping force in southernLebanon.
A UN spokesman said he had received "no indication" that Parisintended to withdraw those troops.
Former French Prime Minister Laurent Fabius said on March 14that France might have to evacuate its nationals from Lebanon becausethere were elements "who are trying to force us to withdraw fromthere."
Fabius' warning came hours after the Moslem fundamentalistRevolutionary Justice Organization announced it was holding afour-man French television crew.
Three other French hostages are being held by the pro-IranianIslamic Jihad terrorist group, which claims to have killed a fourthFrenchman.
Комментариев нет:
Отправить комментарий