China threatens repercussions for U.S. siding with Israel

By Steven Edwards

And Sheldon Alberts

CanWest News Service

United Nations – The diplomatic divide over the crisis in Lebanon threatened to affect other international crisis Thursday after China expressed anger that the United States “watered down” a United Nations Security Council statement on the deadly Israeli strike on a UN observer mission.

Released after two days of back room negotiations, the statement expressed “shock and distress” at the bombing, but fell short of China’s demand that council members “condemn any deliberate attack against UN personnel.”

The United States also opposed China’s call for the council to demand Israel allow the United Nations to join the Israeli inquiry into the incident.

While a Canadian was among the four observers killed in the Tuesday strike, so too was a serviceman from China, which holds a permanent veto-bearing seat alongside the United States on the Security Council.

It’s there that Washington is also pushing for council action that would curb Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

“On the issue of Iran, not all member states share the same view,” said Wang Guangya, China’s ambassador to the UN.

He said Washington’s opposition to a strong statement on the Israeli strike would have a “negative impact” on the Iran talks.

He also expressed “frustration” that it has taken hours of talks to produce the statement.

“The frustration will definitely affect working relations, somewhat” he said.

China joined by Russia, also a permanent council member, have been reluctant to agree to U.S. led western demands for threatening Iran with sanctions if it does not suspend its uranium enrichment program, which could eventually give Tehran the capability of producing fuel for a nuclear bomb.

But U.S. Ambassador John Bolton has over the past week expressed confidence that both countries, which have trade and political ties with Tehran, were coming around. Bolton was in Washington on Thursday attending Senate confirmation hearings on his possible re-nomination, and Molly Phee, a U.S. deputy political councillor standing in for him, made no comment.

Council members were scheduled to discuss Iran’s nuclear program today but it was uncertain whether the meeting will go ahead.

UN deliberately targeted by Israeli precision guided missiles

Wife of missing UN observer believes he is alive in rubble

By Mike Blanchfield

CanWest News Service

And Frank Armstrong

Kinston Whig-Standard

Kingston, Ont. – The wife of Maj.Paeta Hess-von Kruedener says she has not given up hope her husband is alive somewhere in the rubble of his bombed-out south Lebanon UN observation post, as she blamed Israel for deliberately targeting her husband’s neutral position.

.Í believe in miracles,” Cynthia Hess-von Kruedener said Thursday.

“Why did they bomb the UN site? In my opinion, those are precision-guided missiles, then that is intentional – with 3 bombs.”

Whether the attack was deliberate and whether the UN observers should have been withdrawn – as Prime Minister Stephan Harper suggested earlier this week – remains a hotly debated question.

One of the Defence Department’s leading experts on peacekeeping suggested Harper demonstrated a lack of understanding when he questioned why four unarmed UN monitors, including Hess-von Kruedener, remained at their southern Lebanon post only to be killed.

“I think it shows the Prime Minister was not adequately briefed. He needs to know what the function of military observers are,” said Walter Dorn, a professor specializing in UN peacekeeping and monitoring missions at the Royal Military College in Kinston, Ont.

“It is during times of conflict these observers are most valuable because that’s when they’re the eyes and ears of the international community,” Dorn added in a telephone interview from New York, where he is beginning a six-month term as a visiting expert at the UN.

Dorn said many fellow Canadians at the UN in New York expressed “shock and dismay” at Harper’s remarks following the death of Hess-von Kruedener, who was killed Tuesday along with three colleagues in an Israeli air strike on their observation post in south Lebanon.

Speaking in New Brunswick on Wednesday, Harper said he doubted the bombing was a deliberate attack by Israel, but added: “We want to find out why this United Nations post was attacked and also why it remained manned, during what is, more or less, a war, during obvious danger to these particular individuals.”

Harper called for a full investigation into the circumstances of the bombing.

UN officials reacted coolly to Harper’s suggestion that their observation team should have been pulled out.

“The UN mission in Lebanon is there under a Security Council resolution since 1978. In terms of the specific patrol post that the four UN military observers were based in they were posted in a well marked area and the United Nations had assurances and reassurances that they would not come under attack,” Marie Okabe, spokeswoman for UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, said Thursday when asked about Harper’s comments.

Hess-von Kredener’s wife and Dorn also pointed out the UN observation post was well marked and would have been well known to the Israeli Defence Force.

“It’s a three-story building, ver solid looking, painted white so it would be very clear to see with the large black UN markings on the side. It flies a UN flag very high, it must be up around six stories,” said Dorn.

“If they knew they were being deliberately targeted, an evacuation plan would have been worth it. And should have been carried out. But they got repeated assurances over a period of six hours that they were not being targeted.”

Evacuation of Canadians from Lebanon

Canada Poised to wind down Lebanon evacuation operation

By Matthew Fisher

CanWest News Service:

BEIRUT – Canada’s evacuation effort in Lebanon will end Saturday, giving stranded citizens a last chance to escape the violence and turmoil that has gripped the country for more than two weeks.

While it was difficult to gauge how many Canadians still wished to leave Lebanon and how many had left on their own, there was a feeling that demand for the evacuation program was diminishing, said Lt.-Col. Shane Brennan, who has run the evacuation effort here from the Canadian Embassy.

About 1,400 Canadians boarded four chartered vessels in Beirut on Thursday bound for Cyprus and Turkey where air craft were to take them to Canada.

This brought to more than 11,700 the number of Canadian citizens who have left Lebanon with Canada’s help.

Canada has been the last western country still assisting its citizens to get out of Lebanon on chartered ships for several days now.

As the country closes one of Lebanon’s last links with the outside world, Israel’s security cabinet sent mixed signals Thursday about the direction of its ongoing war against Hezbollah.

Israel announced the call-up of three more army combat divisions while at the same time saying it did not intend to expand its current ground operations against Hezbollah in southern Lebanon.

The seven-member security committee made the decision a day after nine Israeli soldiers died when they were ambushed by Hezbollah fighters just inside the Lebanese border.

The call-up of reservists was required “to prepare us for all options,” the Israeli Defence Forces top general, Dan Halutz, told a news conference. He described the damage already inflicted on Hezbollah as “huge.”

As Israel stepped up its air campaign Thursday with attacks against targets in the Bekaa Valley, as well in border areas, Hezbollah responded by launching about 50 more rockets into Israel.

Although resistance from Hezbollah has been greater than expected, and Israeli infantry, armour and artillery units have had trouble operating in southern Lebanon’s hilly, broken terrain, support for how the government of Ehud Olmert was handling the crisis remained strong. A poll in the ‘Maariv” daily newspaper found 82 per cent of Israelis back the current Offence and 95 per cent Israel had responded correctly to Israel’s abduction of its soldiers.