What Arab Reconciliation when Arms Smuggling Continues?
The Lebanese Forces leader said Wednesday in Kuwait that any attempt for an Arab reconciliation must not neglect core issues such as cross-border weapons smuggling from Syria, the demarcation of Lebanese-Syrian borders and the armament of Palestinian camps.
"Any serious effort toward an inter-Arab reconciliation must focus on (resolving) central disputes, which are not only political in nature but also strategic," Samir Geagea told a news conference in Kuwait City.
Geagea”s remarks coincide with a mini-Arab summit in Saudi Arabia between King Abdullah, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and Egypt”s President Hosni Mubarak, in the latest sign of Saudi-Syrian thaw in frosty relations.
While assuring Kuwait”s emir of his support to Arab rapprochement, Geagea advised against neglecting issues that touch upon Lebanon”s sovereignty.
"How can we possibly envision reconciliation at a time when sisterly Syria still allows cross-border smuggling of weapons … and when certain (Arabs) still extend aid to armed camps in Lebanon?" Geagea asked.
He criticized the disenchantment of "some Arab sides" of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, set up to try the suspected killers of ex-Premier Rafik Hariri.
He asked "how can we even speak of reconciliation when there is an Arab country that still refuses to demarcate its borders with Lebanon and refuses to release the hundreds of Lebanese prisoners lurking in its jails?"