Explosions rock Hezbollah arms depot near Israel border

The Lebanese army and the United Nations Interim Forces in Southern Lebanon (UNIFIL) were Tuesday investigating a series of explosions in an abandoned building in southern Lebanon considered a stronghold of Hezbollah, an Lebanese army source said.

While authorities remained tight-lipped about the blast, television reports it was at an arms depot belonging to Hezbollah. One Lebanese security official said that the blast was caused by a fire.

The depot contained rockets, automatic weapons and ammunition dating back to the July 2006 war, the reports said.

The explosion happened earlier Tuesday in the outskirts of Khirbit Selim, 20 kilometers from the border with Israel. The army promptly cordoned off the area and prevented reporters approaching.

Following the 33-day war in July 2006 between Hezbollah and Israel, several arm depots were found in southern Lebanon by the army and the UN forces which were deployed in the area following the war.

UN resolution 1701, which ended the war in 2006, calls for the disarming of all militias including Hezbollah. But the Shiite movement has refused to disarm, saying its arsenal is needed to confront any attack by Israel on Lebanon.

Israel has on several occasion expressed its worries to the UN about Hezbollah arms. According to Israeli reports, Hezbollah has arsenal that includes 10,000 long-range rockets and 20,000 short- range rockets in southern Lebanon.

In a speech on February 17, 2009, Hezbollah chief Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah defended his group's right to possess and use anti-aircraft weapons in its struggle against Israel.

"We have the right, the entire right to possess any weapon, including air defence weapons, and we have also the right to use these weapons when we need them," Nasrallah said during a rally.