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Lebanon Refuses to Back U.S. Stance on Hezbollah
BEIRUT, Nov 7 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - U.S. ambassador Vincent Battle said Wednesday that Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri had confirmed that Beirut rejects a U.S. demand to freeze the assets of Hezbollah, considering it a resistance group and not a terrorist organization.
"I did get an answer ... the answer of the Lebanese government is to continue to insist on the distinction that they have for many, many weeks now put forward between resistance organizations and terrorist organizations," Battle said.
"We made a formal request on Friday with the ministry of foreign affairs, with the minister of foreign affairs, that there be cooperation for the freezing of assets," he told reporters after meeting with Hariri.
However, he said "we did not use the word 'immediately.' This kind of action, of course, requires a great deal of research."
He said the Central Bank of Lebanon and its special investigative committee "has been working very hard over many, many weeks in cooperation with the commercial banks of Lebanon to check the records of all these banks."
He also said the action was meant "to determine whether there are any assets that need to be frozen so it is not a question of immediate, it is a very, very long and technical exercise."
"In response to the requests that we have made for cooperation in the field of freezing assets specifically, I made the point to the prime minister that our focus of attention continues to be Osama bin Laden, the Taliban and the network of terrorist organizations linked to Osama bin Laden."
Influential parliament speaker Nabih Berri said Wednesday after talking with Battle that "I informed the American ambassador of the official position of the Lebanese parliament."
"I have just told him [Battle] that Lebanon rejects what is called the new American list" of organizations proscribed by Washington as part of the U.S. war on terrorism, Berri added.
Berri's comments were the first official reaction to the U.S. demand.
The parliamentary speaker, who heads the Shiite Amal group, a rival of Hezbollah, accused the United States of "visibly adopting the Israeli position," which is "hostile to the resistance and to the Intifada [uprising], is against the Arabs and supports terrorism, not the reverse."
"The resistance in Lebanon and the Intifada in Palestine is not terrorism but, on the contrary, constitute war against the terrorism represented by Israeli occupation."
Washington announced Friday that Hezbollah is included on a list of 22 "terrorist" organizations whose assets should be frozen as part of the U.S.-led war on terror.
Battle said he had informed Hariri "that the most recent list ... of requests for foreign asset controls would not be notified to the United Nations under any of the Security Council resolutions."
Lebanon is politically under the thumb of neighboring Syria. Damascus, along with Tehran, backs Hezbollah, calling it a legitimate resistance movement, notably against Israel's continued occupation of the disputed Shebaa Farms area.
Additionally, State Department official David Satterfield - the former U.S. ambassador to Lebanon - stated in 1998 that Hezbollah constituted a legitimate freedom fighting force, and that its activities can be characterized as "resistance".
During a tour of southern Lebanon in December of 1998, Satterfield was asked about Hezbollah and according to the Arab newspaper,
Al-Nahar, he defended the group, saying, "We make a distinction between resistance and terror. We don't think that this resistance is terrorism."
Hezbollah, which spearheaded the war that drove Israel out of southern Lebanon in May 2000, is still leading a guerrilla war against Israeli troops in the Shebaa Farms area.
But Hezbollah is also a political movement, with nine members in Lebanon's parliament and overwhelming control, along with Amal, of southern and eastern Lebanon.
On Saturday, British Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown also announced a freeze on the assets of 25 organizations deemed to be terrorist, including Hezbollah.
But a British embassy source told Agence France-Presse (AFP) here Monday that the whole of Hezbollah was not being targeted by London.
"We believe that separate from its role as a political party, Hezbollah has a terrorist wing, or 'external security organization', which meets the criteria for proscription" under British law, the source said.
"We did not proscribe Hezbollah as a whole. Proscription covers only that wing, which carries out activities falling under the definition of our Terrorism Act," the source said.
Hezbollah itself responded defiantly to Washington's new list on Sunday. Its secretary general, Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, said it was both "logical" and "an honor" to feature on the list, having refused to "abandon the resistance ... and stop its support for the Palestinian people."
Lebanese Finance Minister Fouad Siniora said Tuesday, "The country will not follow the United States in freezing Hezbollah assets because it views the group as a resistance movement and not a terrorist organization," a local daily reported.
"Our [Lebanon's] position is that terrorism must be defined and we stress that those who are trying to liberate their lands are merely practicing resistance," Siniora told the
Daily Star.
In a related development, the head of Hamas, Khaled Mashaal, said on Tuesday that his group was indifferent to being blacklisted by the U.S. and reaffirmed that "anti-Israeli resistance is the only alternative which could achieve our mission and objectives," according to the same paper.
Mashaal added that the recent classification would have little impact on Arab attitudes overall and affirmed that Arabs would continue to support "anti-occupation" resistance activities.
He also accused the U.S. of aiding and abetting the terrorism practiced by the Zionist state against the Palestinian people, the
Daily Star reported.
Also Tuesday, the National Bloc in Lebanon said that it was surprised that Washington did not include Israel on the list of terrorists.
"Has Washington's memory failed it?" the group asked, "Has it forgotten the 1996 Qana massacre, Deir Yassin, Sabra and Shatila, the murder of Count Bernadote, the King David Hotel incident and the terrorist attack against the USS Liberty?"
It also called on the U.S. administration to end its "double standard policy" in the region.
Lebanese MP George Najm also lashed out at the United States for including Hezbollah on the new list of terrorists.
"This inclusion did not come as a surprise to the people of this country because the resistance has always been blacklisted as far as Washington is concerned," he said.
Najm added that the U.S. had always opposed resistance movements and the struggle for freedom and liberation from Israel and its oppressive policies, and accused the U.S. of "succumbing to the Zionist lobby."
He also said that Hezbollah would continue its struggle irrespective of U.S. designations.
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