France is willing to lead the enlarged UN force in Lebanon until at least February, the French defence minister said today.
But Michele Alliot-Marie warned that France's peacekeepers need to have a clear mission or the situation could turn to catastrophe.
In an interview with France-2 television, Ms Alliot-Marie said that the mandate of the strengthened new force is still "fuzzy."
"When you send in a force and its mission is not precise enough, and its resources are not well adapted or large enough, that can turn into a catastrophe, including for the solders that we send," she said.
The force is expected to grow from the current 2,000 troops to 15,000 troops under a new UN resolution.
An estimated 15,000 Lebanese troops are to join the strengthened UN force, which is to move south of the Litani River, about 18 miles from the Israeli border.
The resolution passed on Friday authorises the force, known as UNIFIL, to use "all necessary action... to ensure that its area of operations is not utilised for hostile activities of any kind."
It can use force to ensure the movement of aid workers and protect civilians in imminent danger, among other situations. But France has been demanding a more specific mandate for the force, including when it may use firepower.
UN diplomats and officials say France's reticence to give a number has held up announcements of troop commitments from other countries.
In 1983, 58 French paratroopers were killed in an attack in Beirut — a memory that still haunts France.
The UNIFIL, in its existing state, is often criticised for being ineffective. Italy, Turkey, Malaysia and Indonesia have also indicated they will make significant contributions. A fragile UN ceasefire went into effect on Monday, ending more than a month of fighting.
Yesterday, Israeli forces began slowly pulling out from southern Lebanon and made plans to hand over the territory.
Hundreds of people died and hundreds of thousands more were forced to flee as the violence raged. France, along with the US, played a key role in crafting the UN Security Council resolution that called for a ceasefire as well as expanding UNIFIL.
The French foreign minister, Philippe Douste-Blazy, was in Lebanon today to discuss the force. It was his fourth trip to the region since fighting broke out.
Israel and Hizbollah have generally maintained a fragile truce in the south since Monday.
An estimated 200,000 mostly Shia refugees have streamed home this week, many of them to villages devastated by bombing. The truce has allowed belated burials of some war victims.
"It's the first chance we've had. We've been on the road for 11 hours," said Raouf Shayato, who arrived at Tyre hospital to collect the body of his cousin Nazira, killed on July 22nd.
More than 100 corpses lie unclaimed at the overflowing hospital mortuary. Officials postponed plans for a mass burial to give relatives more time to collect them.
Civilians have returned en masse without waiting for Israel to leave pockets of territory it has occupied in the south.
"If the Lebanese army does not move down within a number of days to the south ... the way I see it, we must stop our withdrawal," Israeli army chief Dan Halutz said.
However, a senior Israeli government official, who asked not to be named, said Israeli forces would not withdraw completely until the expanded UN force and Lebanese army move in.
Before that, the official said, the army would pull back gradually to a narrow no-go zone along the border, which it could control largely with artillery, tank fire and air strikes. Hizbollah reiterated that it has the right to attack any Israeli forces remaining on Lebanese soil.
"The presence of Israeli tanks in the south is an aggression and the resistance reserves its right to face such aggression if it persists," Sheikh Nabil Kaouk, Hizbollah's top official in south Lebanon, told reporters in Tyre.