Paris, 18 Oct. (AKI) - Palestinian refugees in Lebanon have mixed views on calls for them to hand in their weapons. Representatives of the different factions discussed the issue as talks were held on Tuesday between Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas and Lebanese prime minister Fuad Siniora. The talks in the French capital were held under the auspices of the UN which is trying to persuade all parties to abide with a UN Security Council resolution for the disarmament of all militias in Lebanon.

On Monday, Siniora and Abbas held talks with Terje Roed-Larsen, the UN envoy responsible for the implementation of Resolution 1559 which calls for the militias to hand in their weapons.

"The arms are necessary because of the instability inside the camps," says Khaled Aref, a commander of the main Palestinian faction Fatah based in the Ayn al-Helwe refugee camp, while admitting that the situation "needs to be regularised".

"However it would be a mistake to give up the arms. First they should allow us to return to our homes [in Palestine] and then we will disarm," he continued. "If we really have to die then we want to die with honour. The world really expects us to surrender and to be massacred without putting up a fight as in 1982," said Aref, referring to the killing by Lebanese militiamen of thousands of Palestinian refugees in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps in 1982.

There are some 350,000 Palestinians registered as refugees in Lebanon, most of them are either people displaced by the 1948 war that created Israel, or their descendants. The refugees live in 12 overcrowded and often violent camps in Beirut and across Lebanon.