Lebanese PM vows to remove militants from camp

Lebanon’s prime minister vowed to wipe out an Islamic militant group barricaded in a Palestinian refugee camp, raising the prospect that the army will either storm the camp or dig in for a long siege to force its surrender.

Sporadic gunfire yesterday, which grew heavier for a short period after nightfall, marred the two-day-old truce as the army moved troops around the Nahr el-Bared camp.

However, the troops did not attempt to advance, apparently giving time for negotiations and for the militants to comply with a government ultimatum to surrender or face a military assault.

Fighters from the al-Qaida-inspired Fatah Islam militant group, estimated in the hundreds, have barricaded themselves in the camp, saying they will fight off any Lebanese attack.

The renewed exchanges last night, which each side blamed on the other, illustrated the precarious nature of the standoff and the possibility of increased violence at any time.

Security officials said army positions came under heavy machine gun fire from Fatah Islam militants followed by rocket-propelled grenades. They said the army “dealt” with the source of fire.

Abu Salim Taha, a spokesman for the militants, countered on al-Jazeera television from inside the camp by saying it was the army that opened fire. He said the group’s fighters remain committed to the truce.

However, Taha repeated that they will never surrender or flee. “This is impossible. We will fight until the last moment, the last drop of blood and the last bullet,” he said.

The fighting, which broke out Sunday when police raided suspected Fatah Islam hideouts in Tripoli while searching for men wanted in a bank robbery, has killed some 50 combatants and many civilians.

Thousands of Palestinian civilians – mainly women and children – have fled the camp on the outskirts of Tripoli, but many thousands remain inside.

Most of those who fled the camp after the truce took hold on Tuesday packed into the nearby Beddawi refugee camp.

More refugees trickled out of Nahr el-Bared yesterday.

They packed themselves into a few pickup trucks or walked out to the first army checkpoints, where they were inspected and allowed to go on.

Amid reports of Muslim clerics negotiating with the militants to avert an army onslaught, Lebanon’s government appeared to be preparing for the possibility of storming of the camp.

The Lebanese military stays out of the camps under a 1969 agreement that allows the Palestinians to run them.

Prime Minister Fuad Saniora said in a televised address yesterday that Fatah Islam was “a terrorist organisation.” He blamed the group for “attempting to ride on the suffering and the struggle of the Palestinian people.”

“We will work to root out and strike at terrorism, but we will embrace and protect our brothers in the camps,” Saniora said, insisting Lebanon has no quarrel with the 400,000 Palestinian refugees who live in the country.

Meanwhile, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice yesterday blamed the apparent collapse of the truce in Lebanon on extremists trying to “sow discord” as she renewed the Bush administration’s strong support of the Lebanese government.

“I certainly hope that the Lebanese government will be able to deal with these extremists,” Rice said. “It’s just another example of extremists in the Middle East who are trying to destabilise democratic governments.”

Rice, who was on the second day of a trip to California, made her comments in a joint appearance with Australia’s Foreign Minister, Alexander Downer.