Lebanese soldiers die in clashes

23/08/2007| IslamWeb

Two Lebanese soldiers have been killed in clashes with Muslim fighters from the Fatah al-Islam group, which has been battling the army in north Lebanon for more than three months now.

The soldiers died of wounds sustained on Wednesday at the Nahr al-Bared Palestinian refugee camp near Tripoli, a security source said on Thursday.

The army has now lost 143 soldiers in the fighting, Lebanon's worst internal violence since the 1975-1990 civil war.

At least 100 fighters and 42 civilians have also been killed since the violence erupted on May 20.

Negotiations to evacuate the civilians began overnight on Monday after Abu Salim Taha, a Fatah al-Islam spokesman, contacted the clerics seeking a way out from the battered camp for an estimated 20 women and 50 children.

Communication problems

The Lebanese army agreed to the request on Tuesday. But the Palestinian Clerics' Association, which is acting as an intermediary, said Thursday that communication problems had complicated efforts to organise the evacuation.

Sheikh Mohammed al-Hajj, a spokesman, said the Lebanese army and Palestinian clerics are without news from fighters inside a besieged refugee camp over arrangements to evacuate civilians.

He said: "Despite all of our efforts to reach Fatah al-Islam, we haven't made contact with them since on Tuesday."

Loudspeakers and flyers

Al-Hajj said the clerics were planning to meet with the army command on Thursday to discuss the possiblity of using loudspeakers or dropping flyers over the Nahr al-Bared camp in order to reach the fighters.

The number of women and children holed up with the fighters is estimated at 75, he said.

According to a source close to the negotiations, among those to be evacuated are the wife of Shaker al-Abssi, the Fatah al-Islam chief, and the widow of Abu Hureira, his number two, who was killed in recent weeks.

Most of the camp's 40,000 residents fled to a nearby Palestinian refugee camp in the early days of the battle.

PHOTO CAPTION

A general view shows part of the devastated alleys of the Nahr al-Bared refugee camp in north Lebanon August 22, 2007. (Reuters)

Al-Jazeera