LEBANON: SYRIAN TROOPS CONTINUE TO SCALE DOWN MILITARY PRESENCE

Record ID: 276765

  • Title: LEBANON: SYRIAN TROOPS CONTINUE TO SCALE DOWN MILITARY PRESENCE
  • Date: 17th July 2003
  • Summary: (W4) QLAYAAT AIRPORT, LEBANON (JULY 15, 2003) (REUTERS) 1. SLV SYRIAN SOLDIERS MOVING GEAR INTO TRUCKS; SLV SOLDIER CARRYING AMMUNITION (11 SHOTS) 1.39 2. SLV COVERED FIELD GUN; MV SOLDIERS PACKING UP ARTILLERY AND EQUIPMENT AND LOADING GEAR INTO TRUCKS; SLV TRUCK PULLING FIELD GUN DRIVING OFF; SLV TANK ON BACK OF TRANSPORTER LEAVING BASE WITH SOLD
  • Embargoed: 1st August 2003 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: QLAYAAT, LEBANON
  • Country: Lebanon
  • Reuters ID: LVAAUON9QWNRV78S9H4S54VG9XQR
  • Story Text: Syrian troops have continued to scale down their
    military presence in Lebanon.

    Syrian troops quit artillery and tank positions in a
    military airport in northern Lebanon late on Tuesday (July 15,
    2003) in the latest step of a gradual scaling down of
    Damascus' military presence in neighbouring Lebanon.

    Trucks carried Syrian tanks and troops away from the
    airport it occupied at the start of Lebanon's civil war in
    1975, south of the port city of Tripoli toward the Syrian
    border, extending troop movements that began late on Monday
    near the capital Beirut.

    Security sources said at least four large positions in
    northern Lebanon had been evacuated, including the military
    Qlayaat airport and that approximately 1,000 soldiers
    stationed there were leaving the country. Troops also left two
    other positions south of the capital.

    The sources described the move as part of a planned
    withdrawal of several thousand Syrian soldiers that began
    earlier this year.

    Syria has about 15,000 troops in Lebanon, a widely
    resented symbol of the control Damascus gained in Lebanon in
    the aftermath of its 1975-1990 civil war and a force that the
    United States and other Western countries have urged be
    removed.

    Syria has cemented its role in Lebanon since the war, with
    strong ties to the army, presidency, judiciary and security
    services, but in 2001 withdrew its troops from prominent
    positions in Beirut, in an apparent concession to the
    increasingly vocal, Christian-led criticism of their presence.


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