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WASHINGTON – The US State Department announced Wednesday that “real progress” has been made in talks to demarcate the maritime borders between Israel and Lebanon.
This came in a short statement by David Schenker, the US Under Secretary of State for Middle Eastern Affairs, posted on the ministry’s website.
Schenker said that we are close to reaching an agreement on a framework for the land and sea borders between Israel and Lebanon.
He added that Tel Aviv and Beirut have already made some real progress in demarcation of the maritime boundary between them.
In response to a question about his earlier statement in which he said that the framework for the demarcation of the maritime borders between Lebanon and Israel has been completed, the Foreign Ministry official said: “I certainly did not say that we reached an agreement on the framework of maritime and land borders, but we are getting closer to that. “
“David Satterfield, a high-ranking diplomat who is currently our ambassador to Ankara, spent a year traveling between Lebanon and Israel to try to obtain what is in fact just a framework agreement, that is, an agreement that provides a framework that began to negotiate borders, “he said.
He continued: “I think this is an important framework that should have been completed a long time ago because it will provide an opportunity for both Israel and Lebanon to start making real progress, and they are already doing so.”
He added: “I will not go into details about what is hindering (reaching an agreement), but I hope I can come to Lebanon and then sign this agreement in the coming weeks.”
There is a long-standing dispute between the two countries over the demarcation of borders in the eastern Mediterranean, an issue that has risen to prominence in the last decade after huge reserves of natural gas were discovered in the region.
Last year, Israeli Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz expressed disappointment at what he described as Lebanon’s lack of agreement on the US-mediated talks aimed at demarcating maritime borders between the two countries, hinting that Hezbollah is exercising pressure on Beirut.
Israel and Lebanon have been officially in a state of war since Israel’s establishment in the occupied Palestinian territories in 1948 and have long disagreed over the demarcation of borders in the eastern Mediterranean, a problem that emerged in the last decade. when huge deposits of natural gas were discovered in the region.
Lebanese MPs close to the Speaker of the Lebanese parliament, Nabih Berri, quoted him as saying in June 2019 that clear progress had been made in efforts to resolve the border dispute.
