BEIRUT (Agencies)
Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora on Friday said his Western-backed government did not ask Washington to send a U.S. warship to the waters off Lebanon, which is embroiled in a deep political crisis.
While Shiite militant group Hezbollah said the U.S. was endangering regional stability by deploying a warship off Lebanon and vowed to defy what it called an act of military intimidation.
"We did not ask anyone to send warships," Siniora said in a speech during a meeting with Arab ambassadors that was broadcast live on television, adding that no U.S. warship was in "Lebanese waters."
"The Lebanese navy and UNIFIL naval forces, which are helping Lebanon secure its maritime borders, are the only ones" in Lebanese territorial waters, Siniora said in reference to United Nations peacekeepers.
Hezbollah member of parliament Hassan Fadlallah said: "the American move threatens the stability of Lebanon and the region and it is an attempt to spark tension,"
"The American administration has used the policy of sending warships to support its allies in Lebanon before, and that experiment failed and backfired," he said. "We don't succumb to threats and military intimidation practiced by the United States to implement its hegemony over Lebanon."
Washington said on Thursday it had sent the USS Cole guided-missile destroyer to waters off Lebanon and that the vessel was already in the eastern Mediterranean.
The deployment was "a show of support for regional stability" because of "concern about the situation in Lebanon," a U.S. official said on condition of anonymity, declining to say that the show of force was aimed at Syria or Iran.
Lebanon has been without a president since last November amid political feuding between the Western-backed ruling parliamentary majority and the opposition, backed by Syria and Iran.
The majority accuses Syria of blocking efforts to elect a new president in Lebanon, which was under Syrian military domination for 29 years until Damascus withdrew its troops in April 2005. |
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History repeats itself "America repeats the adventure of '82," the headline of the pro-Hezbollah al-Akhbar newspaper said, referring to a big U.S. military deployment in Lebanon after the 1982 Israeli invasion.
At that time the United States deployed Marines in Beirut and warships off the coast to support a Lebanese government trying to reach a peace deal with Israel.
But U.S. forces had to pull out after a series of suicide bombings by pro-Iranian militants, one of which killed 241 Marines. The Lebanese government was forced to scrap its peace agreement with Israel under pressure from Syria and its local allies.
The deployment of the USS Cole was announced two weeks after the assassination of senior Hezbollah commander Imad Moughniyah, who was on the United States' most wanted list of terrorists.
Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah blamed Israel for Moughniyah's killing in Damascus and vowed to avenge his death. Israel denies any links but its secret Mossad spy service had sought the Lebanese militant for two decades.
A U.S. defense official said the Cole left Malta on Tuesday heading toward Lebanon, adding it would not be visible from the Lebanese coast, but would stay "well over the horizon". |
