Democratic Palestine : 34 (ص 20)
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- Democratic Palestine : 34 (ص 20)
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Lebanon’s Dilemma
The political developments in
Lebanon have pushed the conflict to a
dangerous level. This issue has created
a very complicated political situation,
forcing the last Arab summit to take
steps towards resolving the Lebanese
crisis.
Despite intense efforts by the six-man
Arab committee, which was entrusted
by the Arab foreign ministers who met
on January 12th, in Tunis, to bring
about an end to the mad war in
Lebanon, the political and military
escalation has remained in the same
cycle of violence and threatening the
country with total destruction. Aoun’s
practices and deliberate military
escalation caused the lack of progress in
the efforts of the Arab League com-
mittee that was working to resolve the
Lebanese crisis or at least to halt the
bloodletting which has swept Lebanon
since March 8, 1989. In an effort to
revive a collapsed truce that was called
on April 28, the committee arranged a
ceasefire on May 11 after more than
two months of relentless duels across
Beirut. But the truce has been violated
constantly, causing great frustration to
all .those who are looking toward
rebuilding Lebanon on a non-sectarian
basis.
The 14-year-old Lebanese civil war
moved again to the forefront of the
Arab attention when fighting broke out
on March 8 between Aoun’s troops and
the nationalist forces. For the first time
in the League’s history, Lebanon’s seat
remained vacant after an Arab
summit’s meeting of foreign ministers
failed to agree on who should represent
that country in the summit. Arab
leaders believe that inviting both Aoun
and Hoss would only accentuate the
sectarian split in Lebanon. However, a
six-man committee headed by Kuwaiti
Foreign Minister Sheikh Sabah Al
Ahmed AI Sabah had agreed to invite
them to Casablanca to present their
cases at the summit.
Lebanon’s crisis was subject of a
heated debate which threatened to
wreck the extraordinary Arab summit
held in Casablanca, Morocco on May
20
23-26, 1989, and further fragment the
Arab world. Underscoring frustration
over the lack of progress in the debate,
Kuwait resigned from its chairmanship
of the six-man committee on Lebanon.
A bitter confrontation between Syria
and Iraq caused scenes of chaos over
two days of the summit.
As a result, the summit continued for
four days, longer than any previous
summit in the Arab League’s 44-year
history. After intense efforts by Arab
leaders, the summit named Morocco’s
King Hassan II, Saudi Arabia’s King
Fahed and Algerian President Chadli
Ben Jedid to work out a settlement to
the Lebanese crisis. The committee was
given six months to work out a solution
after the previous committee failed.
The summit also expressed its will-
ingness to convene after that to
evaluate the situation and, if necessary,
decide on the next steps.
THE TRIPARTITE
COMMITTEE
Hassan’s three-man committee was
charged with taking the measures it sees
fit with all concerned parties to invite
the members of the Lebanese parlia-
ment to meet, if necessary outside
Lebanon, in order to prepare a political
reform document. This document
would form the basis for national
reconciliation. To ratify the political
reform document, the Lebanese
parliament would meet in Beirut as
soon as _ possible. Following this
ratification, the parliament would elect
a president who would then form a
government of national reconciliation.
The committee would support the
Lebanese national _ reconciliation
government measures it deemed
necessary to exercise full sovereignty
over all Lebanese territory.
In its first meeting in Rabat, Moroc-
co on June 4, the committee appealed,
in a statement released by the Lebanese
daily Al Safir on June 6, for a halt to
«measures which increase _inter-
Lebanese divisions and make the daily
life of Lebanese citizens even more
painful.» The statement said that the
three leaders would aim «to help the
Lebanese people restore life to all their
constitutional institutions and _ in-
troduce reforms in the Lebanese socie-
ty... the necessary political reforms that
would permit the Lebanese state to rally
its people in a free, democratic and just
framework.» They would try to
«restore Arab Lebanon in its national
unity, its independence, its full ter-
ritorial integrity and to restore its
authority over the whole of its national
territory by its own forces «added the
statement.
The second meeting in Wahran,
Algeria on June 27, was devoted to
evaluating the first round of contacts
and consultations of the three foreign
ministers and the Arab League’s envoy
who had been dispatched in a tour of
Syria, Iraq and Lebanon in addition to
the five permenant member states of
the UN Security Council to solicit sup-
port for efforts aimed at solving the
Lebanese crisis. In addition to reaffir-
ming the previous points contained in
the statement of their first meeting,
they expressed their «deep appreciation
to the support and high readiness to
help» which they «received on the Arab
and international levels.» In light of the
«second decisive round» of the foreign
ministers, «the members of the
Lebanese parliament would be invited
to meet outside Lebanon and in any
place they would choose to discuss and
prepare a document of the national
reconciliation. ... cease-fire, lifting all
blockades and re-opening the crossings
linking East and West Beirut would be
necessitated «before the meeting of the
MP’s outside Lebanon which will be an
«introduction for the Lebanese
parliament to meet in Lebanon,» said
Wahran’s statement. (Lebanese daily,
Al Nida, June 29)
OBSTACLES FACING THE
ARAB COMMITTEE
Following the political developments
since the emergence of the three-man
committee the Lebanese crisis has been
provided with intense Arab care, more
than any other time. It is noticeable
Democratic Palestine, August 1989 - هو جزء من
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