Russia to provide political and military support to Lebanon

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev called on Thursday for the full implementation of U.N. Security Council resolution 1701 and vowed coordination with Lebanese authorities to fight terrorism.

“I told the Lebanese president that Russia always called for preserving Lebanon’s sovereignty. Interference in its internal affairs is unacceptable. The Lebanese should themselves solve their problems,” Medvedev said during a joint press conference with his Lebanese counterpart Michel Suleiman in Moscow.

Lebanon and Russia should cooperate with each other at the UN, said Suleiman, noting that Lebanon is a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council.

“Russia supports the sovereignty of Lebanon, as well as the unity of its people,” he reiterated. However, he said that Lebanese should resolve their internal disputes through dialogue without any foreign interference. The current stability in Lebanon is to a high extent Sleiman’s accomplishment, said Medvedev.

The Lebanese and Russian sides also discussed the signing of a military and technical cooperation between the two countries “in an effort to achieve long-term cooperation,” the Lebanese president said. “It is a framework agreement and is planned to be signed in the near future,” said head of Russia’s military-technical cooperation agency, Mikhail Dmitriyev, according to the ITAR-TASS news agency. However, there was no mention of past promises by Russia to deliver 10 MiG-29 fighter jets as a gift for the Lebanese military, an issue that had been discussed by the countries’ defense ministers in December. Under the plan, the fighter jets would be modernized before delivery and the transport of the jets would be paid for by the Russian defense ministry.