German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul has proposed replacing the expiring UN peacekeeping mission in Lebanon with an EU-mandated force to prevent a security vacuum.
“We should examine in the EU whether we can ensure that no security vacuum arises with a European mandate following the UNIFIL mission,” Wadephul said in an interview on RedaktionsNetzwerk Deutschland published on Friday.
Wadephul said Lebanon, with a stabilising government, represented “one of the most hopeful developments in the region at the moment.”
Lebanon and Israel held ambassador-level talks at the US embassy in Rome on Tuesday and Wednesday.
This is their sixth round of face-to-face negotiations since March 2, when Israel began attacking Lebanon under the pretext of fighting Hezbollah.
One of the major bottlenecks in the peace talks is Israel’s insistence that it will keep troops in Lebanese territories which it has occupied.
An EU-mandated force could “create the conditions for the Israeli army to withdraw without Hezbollah returning with its terror,” the minister added.
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When was UNIFIL’s fate decided?
The United Nations Security Council voted to end the UNIFIL mission last August because of sustained diplomatic pressure from the United States and Israel.
The Israelis often criticise the UN force for failing to disarm Hezbollah, although Resolution 1701 – the UN mandate for the body in Lebanon – does not stipulate this.
The US is urging the international community to bolster the Lebanese Armed Forces to fill the vacuum, although questions remain over the military’s ability to take on Hezbollah.
The Lebanese President, Joseph Aoun, has also expressed support for the idea of having an international force after the UNIFIL mandate ends.
The economically hollowed-out Lebanese army lacks the funding, equipment, and political mandate to actively confront Hezbollah.
Forcing the multi-confessional Lebanese army to aggressively disarm the militant group risks fracturing the military along sectarian lines and triggering a domestic civil war, which has historically driven the army to favour coexistence over confrontation.
UNIFIL over the years
UNIFIL has operated in southern Lebanon since Israel’s first invasion in 1978, and it is one of the longest-running UN missions in the world. The force now counts some 7,500 peacekeepers from 48 countries.
