SYRIA: Syria has promised to withdraw all its forces from Lebanon by April 30th and will let a United Nations team verify the pullout, a UN envoy said yesterday.
Damascus ordered the withdrawal, demanded by a Security Council resolution seven months ago, after coming under intense international pressure over the February 14th assassination of a Lebanese former prime minister, Rafik al-Hariri.
The UN envoy, Terje Roed-Larsen, said Syrian foreign minister Farouq al-Shara had told him that "all Syrian troops, military assets and the intelligence apparatus will have been withdrawn fully and completely latest by April 30, 2005".
Mr Roed-Larsen was speaking at a joint news conference with Mr Shara after talks with President Bashar al-Assad in Damascus.
"Syria has agreed that subject to the acceptance of the Lebanese authorities a UN verification team will be dispatched to verify the full Syrian military and intelligence withdrawal," the UN official said.
Syria first sent troops to Lebanon in 1976, early in its 1975-90 civil war, but in recent years had reduced their numbers to about 14,000 from a peak of 40,000.
UN Resolution 1559, sponsored by the United States and France, demanded the departure of all foreign forces, the disbanding of all Lebanese militias and respect for Lebanon's political independence.
"Syria by its full withdrawal from Lebanon would have implemented its part of resolution 1559," Mr Shara said.
The declared timetable means all Syrian forces will have left before Lebanon holds parliamentary elections. The polls were due to have taken place in May, but might be pushed back because of political turmoil since Mr Hariri's killing.
Lebanese opposition leaders have accused Syria, or the Lebanese security agencies that it backs, of responsibility for Mr Hariri's death. Damascus denies any involvement.
"I do hope that the agreement and understandings we've reached today in Damascus will give a positive impetus into Lebanon in the sense that elections will take place speedily and . . . these elections should be free and fair," said Mr Roed-Larsen.
Mr Shara voiced support for the elections, which he said should be held "at the time agreed among the Lebanese".
Last month Mr Assad announced plans for a two-phase troop withdrawal from Lebanon within the framework of the 1990 Taif Accord which ended the Lebanese civil war.
The first stage, under which all Syrian forces pulled back to the eastern Bekaa Valley and some crossed the border, was completed last month. More have left since then.
Mr Roed-Larsen said he was informed that Syria had withdrawn 4,000 troops and closed its security offices in Beirut.
Dozens of Syrian military trucks and some tanks on transporters rolled out of Lebanon yesterday. A Lebanese-Syrian military committee met in Beirut and Damascus in the last few days to agree on the withdrawal timetable and Lebanese army chief Gen Michel Suleiman met Mr Assad in Damascus on Saturday, a Syrian official source said.