Sources: Cooperation with International Community Hinges on Commitment to STL and 1701
إقرأ هذا الخبر بالعربية
Premier Najib Miqati’s cabinet is facing not only the challenge of commitment to the international tribunal but also Lebanon’s implementation of Security Council resolution 1701, Lebanese official sources said.
The sources told pan-Arab daily al-Hayat in remarks published Monday that the government’s challenge is to meet the requirements of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon after the indictment that it issued in ex-Premier Rafik Hariri’s Feb. 2005 assassination.
The other challenge is to commit to 1701 after some countries announced their intention to downgrade their troops participating in UNIFIL following the bomb attack on the Italian patrol near the southern city of Sidon last month.
Ministerial sources said that during talks with diplomats, Miqati stressed that the proof of his intention to cooperate with the STL was the steps taken by the general prosecution to find the four suspects named in the arrest warrants issued by the tribunal.
11 July 2011, 15:55
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It is an impossible situation that Mikati has placed himself. Maneuvering the Policy Statement through Parliament last week was the easy part. The Statement is intrinsically and inherently self contradictory. On the one hand it says that it will work with the STL, on the other, the power in the Mikati government, Hezbollah's "guns" has said "never" to the STL and has engaged in a campaign of trashing the tribunal.
This kind of BS passes in Lebanon, but not in the world.
For the International Community, the test for treating Lebanon as a full member is whether it keeps to its national commitments with regard to 1701 AND 1757, the Resolution that created the STL. If Mikati's government fails, he faces financial isolation and Lebanon faces an international boycott that will wreck Mikati's financial empire and Lebanon's economy.
For Hezbollah, the test will be whether Mikati ignores the STL.
The policy statement debate has only succeeded in delaying the inevitable decision.
