PARIS, Jan 25: Lebanon will need some sort of international force after the withdrawal of the United Nations's Unifil mission scheduled for 2027, Prime Minister Nawaf Salam said during a visit to Paris Saturday.
Some 10,800 UN peacekeepers have manned a buffer zone between Israel and Lebanon since March 1978, but they will have one year to leave Lebanon starting 31 December, under a resolution passed last August under pressure from the United States and Israel.
"We will always need an international presence in the south, and preferably a UN presence, given the impartiality and neutrality that only the UN can provide," Nawaf Salam said the day after a meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron.
The force would need a mix of observers and peacekeepers, largely because of a "history of hostility" with Israel, he added.
UN peacekeepers current operate in southern Lebanon in cooperation with the Lebanese army, part of a ceasefire between Israel and the pro-Iranian Shiite movement Hezbollah in place since November 2024.
While Israel was supposed to withdraw its forces from southern Lebanon, it has maintained them in five areas it considers strategic. �"AFP
