Lebanese big names at the debut table … and “Israel” is “playing” with this step

Maysam Rizk wrote in the newspaper “Al-Akhbar” with the headline “Demarcation: Lebanon refuses to raise the level of representation.” Days after the Speaker of Parliament, Nabih Berri, announced the framework for indirect negotiations between Lebanon and “Israel” on the demarcation of the southern borders, the army command, which is obliged to form a team of officers who will represent Lebanon at the negotiating table, along with a team of experts, to develop a proposal for a group of names. These names must be submitted to the President of the Republic, General Michel Aoun, so that the members of the Lebanese delegation are elected, in accordance with their constitutional powers. According to information from Al-Akhbar, among the nominees are Pilot Brigadier General Bassam Yassin, Deputy Chief of Staff of the Army, in addition to each of the Marines Colonel Mazen Basbous. He is a specialist in this file and has an in-depth study on land and maritime borders, in which he considers that Lebanon’s right to the sea exceeds an area of ​​860 km, “said engineer Colonel Shaker Hajj. These names, according to sources informed, they are not the only ones, as there are other names that will be presented to Aoun today or tomorrow. The President of the Republic will leave her, in consultation with the head of the interim government, Hassan Diab, after their return from Kuwait, which they will visit to express his condolences to his late emir.

The delegation will be headed by an army brigadier general, and will include officers and experts specializing in international law and borders. Their first meeting will be held in the middle of this month in the presence of the US envoy, David Schenker, who will arrive in Lebanon on October 12. The details of the “form” of the negotiations have yet to be resolved between Lebanon and the United Nations: How will the two delegations, the sponsor and the mediator, sit? What will the table look like? Will the same framework, which was adopted in 1996, be adopted by the April Understanding Follow-up Committee, which means that the Lebanese and Israeli delegations each sit in a separate room from the other, or as is happening now? through the tripartite committee (the Lebanese army, UNIFIL, the enemy army) at the international forces headquarters? In Naqoura, which has been meeting periodically for more than 10 years, at a table with three separate sides, without the delegation of Lebanon or the delegation of the enemy direct talks, and each of them addresses the representative of the United Nations. As for the maps, the sources say that the army has all the maps that it began to prepare since 2006, in which the demarcation started from Point (1) towards the south towards the north, and then it turned out that it was poorly drawn and deprived to Lebanon from about 860 square kilometers of water in the economic zone. Exclusive. In addition to the maps that were drawn up in 2008, and included an amendment to point (1) to make Point (23) the starting point of demarcation to the south, which legally returned the 860 square kilometer area to the Lebanese sovereignty, in addition to the exclusive economic zone decree that was issued in 2011 AND deposit it with the United Nations.
The most important thing on these maps is the separation point of the land border in Naqoura, which is point B1, which will have a great influence on the tracing of the direction of the maritime boundary line and therefore the exclusive economic zone. This point in Naqoura was where the “Israeli army” was stationed, although it was located on Lebanese territory. The Lebanese army entered in 2018 and revealed the brand installed since the armistice agreement. And recovering this simple distance on land means recovering about 17 km at the end point of the exclusive economic zone at sea. The enemy had previously tried to make adjustments by pushing the borders about fifty meters to the north, citing security arguments, but Lebanon refused, because the amendment, even by one meter to the north, inevitably means that Lebanon loses tens of kilometers in the sea.
However, it seems that the process of launching the indirect negotiation process may be hampered by some pitfalls, as the “smart” enemy is trying to leak information that the newspaper “Haaretz” reported three days ago that “the Israeli Minister of Energy Yuval Steinitz will lead the talks on the Tel Aviv side, in which the Israeli conditions were formulated. ” For these negotiations two weeks ago, at a meeting headed by Steinitz and senior officials from his ministry, and with the participation of parts of Netanyahu’s office, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Security. To read the full article press Here.