Mansour defends Hezbollah’s Syria role at Geneva II

As expected Lebanese caretaker Foreign Affairs Minister defended Hezbollah’s role in Syria during his address at Syria peace summit stressing that the objections to the intervention of the Shiite group Hezbollah in the war in Syria aim at serving the interests of takfiris.

“Those who claim that Hezbollah’s intervention in Syria carries repercussions on Lebanon want to cover up the entry of takfiris and extremist groups,” Mansour said on Wednesday during his speech at the so called Geneva II meeting which was held in the Swiss city of Montreux .

“They want to divert attention from the facts on the ground and cover up the crimes.” Mansour , a close ally of Hezbollah said .

Mansour noted that these recent regional challenges affected Lebanon’s security.

“And this is clear in the dominance of terrorist and Takfiri ideologies that never had presence before in the region. Lebanon did not survive these destructive ideologies and organizations and a series of explosions targeted more that one area in the country,” the caretaker FM said in reference to the recent bombings of Hezbollah’s strongholds and the Iranian embassy in Beirut .

The Lebanese minister also said that the policy of disassociation adopted by his country was advocated to fend off “further deterioration and displacement” that intervention would have caused.

“The other challenge that Lebanon is facing due to the crisis in Syria is the flow of Syrian refugees,” Mansour added.

“This burden is beyond Lebanon’s capabilities and has left an impact on the general state of the economy, society and security.”

Mansour called for the reconstruction of Syria, explaining that it will protect regional and international peace.

“And we call for this summit to be a path towards national reconciliation and dialogue between different Syrian groups. We are looking forward to Syrian people’s wisdom and constructive dialogue will get Syria out of its crisis, which will ensure attaining the much needed peace.” He said.

One Lebanese observer at the Geneva talks told Ya Liban : ” Iran should not be upset for being kept out of the summit. Mansour did a good job representing the Islamic republic in defending its proxy Hezbollah at the talks” and added : The Lebanese were hoping a new government will be formed at the 11th hour so that Mansour won’t have to come here and represent Lebanon at this summit. ”

Emad Wakim, a key member of March 14 alliance said last November : “If Mansour goes to Geneva he will be representing Hezbollah and not Lebanon”.

Many politicians have on several occasions described Mansour, who represents Speaker Nabih Berri in the cabinet as being “a Syrian Foreign Minister”.

Thousands of Hezbollah fighters are helping the forces loyal to the Syrian regime of president Bashar al Assad in the war against the Sunni rebels who are trying to topple the regime, despite the fact that Hezbollah signed the Baabda declaration which calls for distancing Lebanon from the Syrian events

Syria’s government and opposition, meeting for the first time, angrily spelled out their mutual hostility today at a UN peace conference where world powers also offered sharply divergent views on forcing out Bashar al-Assad.

Syrian opposition spokesman Monzer Akbik said Assad lay at the heart of the conflict: “Assad is the problem,” he said. “We say ‘democracy’, they say ‘Assad’ … We’re talking about a nation, they’re talking about a man. So Assad is the problem and Assad must go in order to start the transition towards democracy.”