Last update - 00:00 19/09/2006
IDF to leave Lebanon as int'l UN force reaches 5,000 troops
By News Agencies
The Israel Defense Forces said on Tuesday it could complete a pullout from southern Lebanon within a few days as the United Nations said the number of peacekeepers in the devastated country had reached 5,000.
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's office said such a level of peacekeepers on the ground in southern Lebanon should enable Israel to finish its withdrawal.
"Things are going as planned at this stage with the coordination. Hopefully we'll leave very soon," Miri Eisin, Olmert's spokeswoman, said.
Speaking from the southern Lebanese town of Naqoura, UNIFIL spokesman Alexander Ivanko said the force in Lebanon now numbered 4,950.
"We're there. We consider it to be 5,000," he said.
Ivanko said some French troops were still heading south from Beirut, but Italian and Spanish forces have already joined some 2,000 UNIFIL troops in position since before the 34-day war.
The Israel Defense Forces will pull out of Lebanon by the New Year holiday that begins sundown Friday, Meretz MK Ran Cohen said Tuesday, quoting the IDF Chief of Staff Da Halutz.
Speaking after Halutz had addressed the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, Cohen said the IDF chief had told him all troops would return to Israel by the start of the holiday.
"He told me unequivocally that he estimates, that if everything goes well, all Israeli soldiers will be out of Lebanon by the eve of the Jewish New Year," Cohen told Israel Radio.
Earlier on Tuesday, Germany's foreign minister urged lawmakers to back plans to send warships for the UN peacekeeping mission in Lebanon and pressed for a broader Middle East peace process.
Germany has offered to send up to 2,400 service personnel and lead a multinational naval force patrolling the Lebanese coast to prevent weapons smugglers from rearming Hezbollah guerrillas after their monthlong war with Israel.
Parliament, which must also approve the mission, is expected to give its backing Wednesday, despite some misgivings related to Germany's Nazi past.
Opening a debate on the deployment, Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said an increasingly united Europe had joined the U.S. as a potential peacemaker in the Middle East.
"For this reason, and because we knew that silencing the guns was only possible with an international presence and a promise of international help, we cannot stand aside," Steinmeier said.
German leaders have pledged to use Berlin's six-month presidency of the European Union, starting in January, to press for a broader Middle East peace process.
Steinmeier said the Quartet - the United Nations, the United States, the EU and Russia - that has sought to guide Israeli-Palestinian peace talks should be revived and given a wider mandate.
He also supported the idea of a Middle East peace conference "to finally settle open questions," but cautioned that such a gathering must not be held too soon.
"I can imagine [the Quartet] with an expanded remit, not just limited to the core conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, but including also the regional conflicts with Lebanon and Syria," Steinmeier said.
"If, in the course of these next steps, a climate of trust and goodwill is created, a Middle East conference could finally obtain substantial results," he said.