 In a departure from language used by the U.N. Security Council, Secretary-General Annan yesterday linked the issue of releasing Israeli soldiers to freeing Lebanese terrorists held by Israel.
| Hmmm... There was a reason that wasn't in the resolution, wasn't there? |
| “You have to talk with those with the guns to stop shooting, whether they are Israelis or whether they are Taliban or anybody else...” |
Hezbollah demanded a prisoner swap when it kidnapped the two soldiers on July 12, launching a month-long war. Mr. Annan, speaking to the press in Beirut, retreated from several demands the Security Council made on Hezbollah and went as far as to equate the conduct of Israeli army soldiers with that of terrorists serving the Taliban regime. "You have to talk with those with the guns to stop shooting, whether they are Israelis or whether they are Taliban or anybody else," he said, referring to the United Nations's need to deliver assistance to victims at times of war.
| When was the last time Kofi had a chat with the Taliban? |
Despite those gestures toward Lebanese Hezbollah supporters — and though he met with the Shiite speaker of Lebanon's parliament, Nabih Berri, and with Hezbollah's Cabinet minister, Muhammed Fneish, as well as Prime Minister Siniora — a Shiite crowd booed the U.N. chief as he visited a hard-hit Beirut neighborhood.
"Kofi go home!"
"Get a rope!"
"Boo!" |
Surrounded by armed guards, Mr. Annan was forced to retreat to his car after a crowd in the Hezbollah-controlled southern Beirut neighborhood booed and heckled him, according to press reports. A day after Hezbollah's leader, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, said in an interview that German, Italian, and U.N. officials are mediating in a possible swap for the Israeli soldiers, Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev, Mr. Annan offered his organization's services as intermediary. |