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Hochstein in Beirut: No Time to Waste to Reach Diplomatic Solution

Berri to Asharq Al-Awsat: Situation today is better than yesterday

Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri (R) meets with the Senior Advisor to US President, Amos Hochstein (L) in Beirut, Lebanon, 14 August 2024. (EPA)
Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri (R) meets with the Senior Advisor to US President, Amos Hochstein (L) in Beirut, Lebanon, 14 August 2024. (EPA)
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Hochstein in Beirut: No Time to Waste to Reach Diplomatic Solution

Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri (R) meets with the Senior Advisor to US President, Amos Hochstein (L) in Beirut, Lebanon, 14 August 2024. (EPA)
Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri (R) meets with the Senior Advisor to US President, Amos Hochstein (L) in Beirut, Lebanon, 14 August 2024. (EPA)

US special envoy Amos Hochstein stressed from Beirut on Wednesday that there was no longer time to waste to reach a ceasefire in Gaza that would in turn lead to a diplomatic solution that would end the escalation between Hezbollah and Lebanon.

Hochstein, tasked with shuttle diplomacy between Lebanon and Israel, spoke to journalists after meeting Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, as the region anxiously anticipates retaliatory attacks from Iran and the allied Lebanese Hezbollah group on Israel.

Hochstein did not arrive to Lebanon from Tel Aviv, as was expected. Rather, he flew in on a Lebanese Middle East Airlines flight from a European country.

He met with Berri, caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati, army commander Joseph Aoun and a number of opposition MPs.

Berri, a key Hezbollah ally, told Asharq Al-Awsat that the meeting was Hochstein was “reassuring”, saying: “The situation today is better than yesterday.”

Hochstein’s visit is a message from US President Joe Biden that “he hasn’t forgotten about Lebanon.”

Berri did not divulge the details of the more than an hour-long meeting with Hochstein, but his comments align with information that said the envoy had requested during his meetings in Lebanon that escalation be avoided before the upcoming Gaza ceasefire talks.

Berri said: “Strong efforts are being exerted to reach a ceasefire.” He spoke of “very intense pressure to reach an agreement that should reflect positively on Lebanon.”

Speaking to reporters after his talks with Berri, Hochstein stated that they discussed the framework of the ceasefire and “we agreed that “there is no more time to waste and there's no more valid excuses from any party for any further delay.”

“The deal would also help enable a diplomatic resolution here in Lebanon,” the envoy added.

It is critical to take advantage of “this window for diplomatic action” to end the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, he stressed, adding that now was the right time.

“The more time goes by of escalated tensions, the more time goes by of daily conflict, the more the odds and the chances go up for accidents, for mistakes, for inadvertent targets to be hit that could easily cause escalation that goes out of control,” Hochstein warned.

Moreover, he revealed he believed that a solution to the conflict could be reached “today”, adding that he realizes that some parties want to tie it to other conflicts. “This is not our position,” he noted.

"We continue to believe that a diplomatic resolution is achievable because we continue to believe that no one truly wants a full-scale war between Lebanon and Israel," Hochstein stressed.

For his part, Berri urged the need to end the Israeli war on Gaza and Lebanon, expressing his “great alarm” with Israel’s political and military escalation, citing the assassinations of Hamas politburo chief Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran and top Hezbollah military commander Fuad Shukr in Beirut last month.

He also cited its ongoing massacres against the Palestinian people, the latest of which took place at a school over the weekend and left scores dead.

“This policy demonstrates Israel’s determination to go ahead with the military escalation and scuttling any effort to stop the war,” remarked the speaker.

He added that Lebanon is committed to extending the term of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) in line with resolution 1701.

Lebanon has been demanding the full implementation of the resolution since its adoption in 2006, he declared.

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UN Envoy: South Sudan is Not Ready to Hold its First Post-Independence Elections in December

File photo: Military trainees parade during the visit of the defense minister to a military training center in Owiny Ki-Bul, Eastern Equatoria, South Sudan on June 27, 2020. (AP Photo/Maura Ajak, File) (ASSOCIATED PRESS)
File photo: Military trainees parade during the visit of the defense minister to a military training center in Owiny Ki-Bul, Eastern Equatoria, South Sudan on June 27, 2020. (AP Photo/Maura Ajak, File) (ASSOCIATED PRESS)
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UN Envoy: South Sudan is Not Ready to Hold its First Post-Independence Elections in December

File photo: Military trainees parade during the visit of the defense minister to a military training center in Owiny Ki-Bul, Eastern Equatoria, South Sudan on June 27, 2020. (AP Photo/Maura Ajak, File) (ASSOCIATED PRESS)
File photo: Military trainees parade during the visit of the defense minister to a military training center in Owiny Ki-Bul, Eastern Equatoria, South Sudan on June 27, 2020. (AP Photo/Maura Ajak, File) (ASSOCIATED PRESS)

South Sudan is not ready to hold its first post-independence elections in December and political players are discussing whether voting should be held this year, the UN’s top envoy in the troubled African country said Wednesday.
Nicholas Haysom told the UN Security Council that the consultations make it difficult to treat the election date of Dec. 22 announced last month by the National Elections Commission “as a definitive trigger in isolation from other critical factors.”
The vote, which would be the first since South Sudan gained independence from Sudan in 2011 after a long conflict, is meant to be the culmination of a peace agreement signed five years ago to pull the world’s newest nation out of a civil war largely based on ethnic divisions. Fighting between forces loyal to the current president, Salva Kiir, battled those loyal to the current vice president, Riek Machar, killing some 400,000 people.
Last December, Haysom outlined a series of conditions needed to hold credible and peaceful elections. In April, he told the Security Council the parties hadn’t implemented a “critical mass” of the key steps for free and fair elections — and he told the UN’s most powerful body Wednesday that his assessment is the same today.
On a positive note, he said the Elections Commission has started assessing “the ground-level infrastructure and facilities required for a conducive environment for conducting elections,” and 29 political parties have been registered.
The UN peacekeeping mission continues “to support the creation of an enabling environment for elections in South Sudan whenever they are held,” focusing on its mandate to help protect civilians, Haysom said..
He said there are concerns among large segments of civil society, political parties, the Commission on Human Rights and the international community about a bill recently passed by South Sudan's parliament that grants the National Security Service the power to make arrests without a warrant.
Critics of the security bill say it contradicts “their aspirations for open civic and political space” to build a democratic society and is incompatible with the spirit of South Sudan's transitional constitution and its human rights obligations, he said.
“It has been noted that the president has the power to refer the law back to Parliament to remedy the criticisms that have been raised,” Haysom said. “This would be a significant opportunity to demonstrate a commitment to achieving the open political space in which to conduct South Sudan’s first democratic elections.”
US Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield told the council that the United States and many diplomatic missions are deeply concerned that the security law could “further erode the country’s political and civic environment.”
Turning to the country’s humanitarian and economic outlook, Haysom warned that “a perfect storm is gathering.”
He pointed to chronic food insecurity, the spillover of the conflict in neighboring Sudan, a rapidly deteriorating economy exacerbated by a ruptured oil pipeline and a cut in revenue, “and the potential for once-in-a-lifetime flooding in September.”
“Any one of these elements on its own presents a significant challenge,” Haysom said. “When taken together, it could push the country to a tipping point — and all during a time where the people of South Sudan are embarking on a delicate phase of nation-building.”
Edem Wosornu, the UN humanitarian office’s operations director, gave the council some stark figures — more than 9 million people, 76% of South Sudan’s population, require humanitarian assistance and 7.1 million are “acutely food insecure, an increase of about 1.5 million people since last year.”
Wosornu said mid-year projections by UN food security experts suggested that conflict and flooding “could result in pockets of famine between June 2024 and January 2025.”
South Sudan’s humanitarian plight is worsened by a deepening economic crisis, she said. Most oil exports have halted since February because of the ruptured pipeline. A more than 70% depreciation of the South Sudanese pound in the first six months of 2024 has made basic commodities unaffordable for many people, with the annual inflation rate reaching 97% in June, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.