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Lebanese president warns withdrawal could cause war

BEIRUT: President Emile Lahoud warned Israel that its planned withdrawal from south Lebanon will lead to war unless it is part of a broader peace agreement.

"An Israeli unilateral withdrawal will not work. It will lead to another war," Lahoud told the London-based Al-Hayat newspaper in an interview published on Saturday.

Lahoud said war could be avoided only if Israel found a solution for the 360,000 Palestinian refugees registered in Lebanon. The refugees were forced from their homes when Israel was created in 1948.

"We want to end this problem. If there is no peace in Lebanon then there is no peace anywhere else and certainly not in Israel," Lahoud told Al-Hayat.

Last Sunday Israel announced it was ending its 22-year-long occupation of south Lebanon, with or without peace with Syria and Lebanon. It had faced increasing guerrilla attacks.

Israeli Foreign Minister David Levy also said withdrawal would remove Syria's power to control attacks inside Lebanon, which gave it leverage in peace talks. Damascus hopes the talks, suspended since January, will restore possession of the Golan Heights, captured in 1967.

Last Wednesday Lahoud said the Lebanese government would not control its borders and guarantee security if Israeli troops withdraw unilaterally by their July deadline.

An Israeli withdrawal would signal peace only in the context of a regional agreement that returned Syria's Golan Heights and solved the refugee problem, he said. Lebanon, Lahoud said, had thousands of armed Palestinian refugees angry at Israel for preventing them returning to their homeland.

Bashar al-Assad, apparent heir apparent to Syrian President Hafez al-Assad, said in a separate interview also by British journalist Patrick Seale that Israel could expect attacks if it withdrew unilaterally from Lebanon.

"The Palestinians were the primary factor that ignited the civil war. If the Israelis withdraw from Lebanon without agreeing to a comprehensive and just peace then they will fight," Bashar said.

Palestinian guerrillas, who had been fighting Israel from Lebanon, were a major factor in Lebanon's 1975-90 civil war. Lebanese leaders across the political spectrum have long insisted that they cannot be permanently settled in Lebanon. -Reuters