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Middle East

My Lords, the Minister has mentioned the possibility of a UN monitoring capability. Does he recognise that the UN’s experience in the Lebanon up to now has been fairly disastrous? UNIFIL has been there for many years in large numbers and quite a lot of people have been killed in the process. It has not managed to achieve very much because it has not had the backing of the international community against two forces that have treated it with contempt—the first being Hezbollah and the second being the Government of Israel, both of which have treated UNIFIL with no respect whatever. If UNIFIL, or another UN force, is to be asked to operate in southern Lebanon, will the Government give serious consideration to the sort of backing that will be required from all the major powers with respect to those two forces that have hitherto not respected UNIFIL?