Beirut, November 25: Efforts by Lebanon’s new government to agree on a policy statement have again stumbled over Hezbollah’s weapons, with Christian members of the Western-backed majority rejecting a hands-off approach.
A cabinet committee set up earlier this month to draft the statement has met eight times and on Wednesday was to sit down again to try to iron out differences on how to phrase a clause that covers the Shiite party’s arms.
The Phalange Party and Lebanese Forces, both Maronite Christian, argue that Hezbollah’s arsenal undermines state authority and runs counter to UN resolutions.
“We cannot accept that there be another authority that has the power or competence to use coercion in Lebanon other than the state,” Social Affairs Minister Salim Sayeh, a member of the Phalange Party, said.
“Any country cannot afford to have two authorities with two commands,” he added. “There should be a monopoly of the state on all issues related to security and weapons.”
However, Hezbollah, which has two ministers in the 30-member unity cabinet, has made it clear that its weapons are not open to discussion.
The party fought a devastating war with Israel in 2006 and argues its arms are necessary to protect the country against any future aggression by Israel, which withdrew from southern Lebanon in 2000 after a 22-year occupation.
“At the end, the cabinet will issue a statement, and we are satisfied a priori with what the statement will say about the arms of the resistance,” Hezbollah deputy chief Sheikh Naim Qassem said earlier this week.
“Those who disagree already know that the majority of the Lebanese population wants this resistance to thrive and prosper,” he said.
Prime Minister Saad Hariri, whose US- and Western-backed alliance defeated a Hezbollah-led opposition supported by Syria and Iran in a June vote, has remained silent as concerns the party’s arms.
But his Druze ally Walid Jumblatt, who temporarily defected from the majority after the June election, has sided with the opposition.
The most likely outcome, according to analysts, is the adoption of a clause that will be a carbon copy of the last government’s policy statement, which recognised, in referring to Hezbollah, the right to bear arms to defend the country against Israel.
Among others, Hariri and President Michel Sleiman say the arms should be discussed as part of an overall national defence strategy.
For almost four years rival leaders have sought in sporadic round-table discussions to agree on a unified defence strategy but have failed to reach agreement largely because of Hezbollah’s weapons.
Lebanon’s government has a history of paralysis: in late 2006, all Shiite ministers resigned from cabinet, setting in motion what would become an 18-month stalemate.
The crisis climaxed in May 2008 when Hezbollah and its allies staged a spectacular takeover of mainly Sunni Muslim west Beirut in protest against a government crackdown on the party.
The clashes left more than 100 people dead and brought the country to the brink of renewed civil war.
Hezbollah, the only faction that did not disarm after the 1975-1990 civil war, has participated in government since 2005.
—Agencies