Lebanonwire.com | Lebanon restricts Palestinian weapons to refugee camps

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October 8, 2005

Lebanon restricts Palestinian weapons to refugee camps
Hadi Khatib

BEIRUT, Lebanon, October 8 (Lebanonwire) -- Following two separate meetings with representatives of 16 Palestinian factions, including pro-Syrian groups, Prime Minister Fouad Siniora announced that Lebanon is the only authority in charge of the country’s security and that Palestinian weapons are prohibited outside the refugee camps.

Today’s meetings were less about implementing UN 1559, which calls for disbanding all militia on Lebanese soil, including Hezbollah and the Palestinians, and more about saving face with the international community by giving the impression that Lebanon has security issues under control.

“The Lebanese government is the only authority in charge of protecting Lebanese and foreigners on its soil and so there is no need for Palestinian arms outside the (refugee) camps,” Siniora announced today.

As for weapons inside the camp, Siniora said “we will leave this to internal dialogue”, sounding a familiar tune both Lebanese and the international community already heard with respect to Hezbollah.

Siniora said that “the recent Palestinian show of force does not serve the Palestinians' cause and theri right of return” and admitted that living conditions within the camps are “below acceptable standards”, adding that Palestinian dignity has to be preserved by improving that situation.

In two rounds of talks taking nearly three hours, both the Lebanese and Palestinian ends agreed to form a follow-up committee to see the implementation of all the aspects of today’s arrangements.

Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblatt said “we need to reinforce a continuous dialogue with the Palestinians to ensure a solution agreeable to everyone, and give the army the full authority to maintain order and security and protect the resistance.

Head of the Fateh movement Sultan Abu AL Aynayn announced in a press conference that the security measures taken with the Army “were precautionary steps against any Israeli assault aimed at creating further tension between Lebanese and Palestinians.”

Other representatives said that the camps will not remain “insecure islands” and that Palestinians will make an effort not to exhibit and showcase their arsenal there.

Hezbollah invited Abu AL Ayn, head of one of the Palestinian factions represented in today’s meetings, to tour liberated areas of the South, including the infamous Al-Khiam prison and promised it would soon hold separate meeting with the Palestinians to arrive at the “correct solution.”

The army meanwhile continued its heavy patrolling of the Syrian Lebanese borders, where according to television station New TV, a shooting took place when two armed gunmen failed to stop their truck when ordered to, leaving them injured and hospitalized.

New TV said that there are 19 passages that smugglers of weapons, illegal drugs, fuel derivatives and militiamen use in areas concentrated in Zahleh, Jib Jennine and Baalbeck, usually starting at 12 midnight under the cover of darkness, a fact corroborated with residents there.