Occupied Shibaa Farms to be demarcated, as UN meets to discuss Resolution 1559

Source: Compiled by Moqawama.org, 31-10-2006
BEIRUT: The UN has officially appointed a cartographer to demarcate the precise location and area of the occupied Shibaa Farms, as members of the Security Council met with UN envoy Terje Roed-Larsen late Monday to issue a presidential statement on the implementation of Resolution 1559.
"A cartographer and a small technical team have been named to settle the legal, political and cartographical issue of (occupied) Shibaa Farms," a UN spokesperson in New York told The Daily Star. He declined to provide the name of the cartographer for security reasons, but said "he is from the Balkans."
Reports of the move were first made public over the weekend by "Israeli" Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, who said the cartographer would settle the dispute over land occupied by "Israel" since its withdrawal from most of South Lebanon in 2000.
The cartographer was to start work in mid-November from UN headquarters in New York and later would visit (occupied) Shibaa, "Israeli" daily Haaretz reported Livni as telling the "Israeli" Cabinet on Sunday.
The course of action was determined following an October 19 report from Roed-Larsen on the implementation of UN Security Council Resolution 1559.
The Security Council meeting with Roed-Larsen was expected to focus on Hizbullah`s disarmament and the demarcation of the (occupied) Shibaa borders.
Roed-Larsen`s report contained renewed calls for the disarmament of Hizbullah and non-Lebanese militias, along with calls for the "strict respect of the sovereignty, territorial integrity, unity, and political independence of Lebanon under the sole and exclusive authority of the government."
The report also outlined "considerable progress towards [1559`s] full implementation," in the withdrawal of all foreign troops from Lebanon and the deployment of the Lebanese Army in the South.
"Israel" took over the (occupied) Shibaa Farms area in 1967 and sees it as part of the Golan Heights, but Hizbullah and Lebanon claim that this is Lebanese territory still under "Israeli" occupation.
United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice tried to persuade Prime
Minister Ehud Olmert to agree to discuss Shiba Farms, but he refused.