French foreign minister pushes for immediate cease-fire
(AP)
Updated: 2006-07-31 16:31
French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy was in Lebanon on Monday to
push for an immediate cease-fire, one day after an Israeli raid on the southern
Lebanese town of Qana that left 56 dead.
Douste-Blazy was to meet with Lebanese leaders in Beirut, Foreign Ministry
officials said.
In an interview published Monday in the French daily Le Figaro, Douste-Blazy
said France was "ready to participate" in an international force in Lebanon, but
"only after a political agreement, and not before." He added that France was
determined "not to enter into the spiral of violence."
France, which has historic ties to Lebanon, has taken an active role in the
effort to broker an end to the latest fighting in the Middle East.
Over the weekend, it circulated a draft U.N. resolution among Security
Council members that would call for an immediate halt to fighting. The United
States and Britain have also called for a resolution - but one that would deploy
an international force without a cease-fire first.
Douste-Blazy said that had France's calls for a cease-fire been heeded,
Sunday's deadly attack on the Southern Lebanese village of Qana "would not have
happened, and human lives would have been saved."
An Israeli airstrike early Sunday on a three-story building in Qana killed 56
people, most of them women and children still asleep at the time, according to
Red Cross officials and Lebanese police.
In light of the attack, finding a political solution to the crisis is more
urgent than ever, Douste-Blazy was quoted as saying.
"Public opinion in the Middle East is becoming more radicalized," he said.
"If we do not have a discussion with all the parties as soon as possible, we run
the risk of a conflict that would go beyond the region and which would pit the
Muslim world against the West. It would be tragic."
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