Beirut: Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri affirmed that bilateral agreements between Lebanon and Israel do not constitute a substitute for an international presence in the south, as long as Israel refuses to abide by the “Framework Agreement.”

According to National Iraqi News Agency, Berri stated that the United States’ insistence on refusing to renew the mandate of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) necessitates the search for a replacement force with European-American consensus. This force would be deployed in southern Lebanon under the UN flag, otherwise, the legal basis for maintaining the international mandate and upholding its role as the sole guarantor of support for the Lebanese army in extending state sovereignty over all its territory would be lost, contingent upon Israel’s withdrawal to the international border.

Berri emphasized that bilateral agreements between Lebanon and Israel are not a substitute for an international presence in the south, as long as Tel Aviv refuses to implement what the two countries reached under the “Framework Agreement,” sponsored by the United States, regarding the implementation of the first “pilot phase” and the establishment of a mechanism to verify the army’s deployment in the towns covered by it. Despite his opposition to the agreement, Berri had proposed expanding it by adopting the judiciary, according to the administrative divisions of the South, instead of limiting it to the occupied town of Zawtar al-Gharbiyah, and including liberated towns within it.