U.N. Troops Held Hostage in Lebanon : Militia Seizes Finns, Threatens Death if Foe Won’t Free Prisoners

The Israeli-supported South Lebanon Army militia Friday captured and threatened to kill more than 20 Finnish U.N. peacekeeping soldiers unless an opposing Shia Muslim group frees 11 SLA members it is holding.

Details were confusing and accounts conflicted about the incident, which began during the early afternoon in the so-called security zone in southern Lebanon. The zone has been established by Israel to protect its northern border following the withdrawal of its troops from Lebanon.

The South Lebanon force threatened to kill one of the Finnish soldiers every hour, but the hourly deadlines passed with no executions, and U.N. officials said they expected negotiations to extend at least into today.

Approached Checkpoint

According to one account, the trouble began when 11 SLA members approached a checkpoint manned by five Finnish soldiers belonging to the U.N. Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) at Qantara, on the coastal road about six miles north of the Israeli border.

They reportedly turned their weapons over to the Finns and said they were going to surrender to a detachment of Amal, a Shia Muslim militia that is contending with the SLA for control of southern Lebanon. That account is disputed by both Amal and the SLA, but the 11 men ended up in Amal’s hands.

A short time later, U.N. spokesman Timor Goksel said, several South Lebanon Army troopers arrived at the checkpoint, disarmed the Finns and made them hostages. Not long after, Goksel continued in a telephone interview from his office in Naqoura, Lebanon, South Lebanon Army soldiers stopped a bus carrying 19 other Finnish U.N. soldiers from Israel to their headquarters in Naqoura and took them into custody as well.

Finnish Officer Freed

He added that a Finnish officer, one of those captured at the checkpoint, was then released with instructions to tell Irish Gen. William Callaghan, commander of UNIFIL, that one of the captured soldiers would be killed each hour starting at 8 p.m. Israel time unless the men held by Amal were turned over to the South Lebanon Army.

The U.N. force refused, saying it did not have the 11 men in custody, but the reported deadline passed and, Goksel said, no one had been killed.

During the night, the U.N. command reported that it had received word from the 19 Finns captured on the bus, which was still near the point where it was captured, that they were in good condition and were being fed. The others could be seen by members of the U.N. force that surrounded the checkpoint and it was known that they had not been harmed, Goksel said.

At the same time, the U.N. spokesman added, he had passed on assurances from Amal to the South Lebanon Army that the 11 men originally involved were also being well cared for and that the U.N. contingent had sent two officers to verify that claim.

Later, Goksel reported that a second Finnish soldier had been released from the checkpoint, but he said he had no details and did not know why the man had been freed.

SLA officers could not be reached for their version, but Israeli military sources released a statement on behalf of the largely Christian militia, which was created by the Israelis to police the security zone on its behalf. These sources said the South Lebanon Army reported “that several dozen soldiers belonging to the Finnish battalion (of UNIFIL) attacked on its own initiative” an SLA checkpoint.

The Finns “fired in the air and arrested 11 (SLA) soldiers,” the sources added, “confiscated weapons and equipment and forced them out of the security zone,” presumably into an area controlled by Amal. The 11 men were then taken away in civilian vehicles belonging to Amal, the sources said.

Although Christians dominate the Israeli-backed force, the militia has some Shia Muslim members. As a result, there was speculation Friday that the 11 men are Shias and went over to Amal voluntarily. About a week ago, 25 other South Lebanon Army members defected to Amal.

Early Morning Battle

According to some news agencies and local reporters at Tyre, an Amal stronghold in southern Lebanon, Amal leaders said the 11 men were captured after an early morning battle at a checkpoint near Qantara.

The statement read by the Israeli military sources did not mention any death threats but said the South Lebanon Army considers the matter “to be of the highest gravity” and acknowledged that the U.N. troops had been detained and will be held “until UNIFIL will return the SLA soldiers.”

Goksel, the U.N. spokesman, said, “It is a serious threat, and we are taking it seriously,” adding that “some military precautions were taken,” presumably by surrounding the area with other U.N. forces.

However, he said, “We don’t attack. We will exhaust all other means. We will use force only as a last resort.” The “other means” included direct negotiations with SLA leaders at the scene as well as with Israeli army officers in the area. However, Goksel said, the U.N. command had had no direct contact with Gen. Antoine Lahad, the former Lebanese army general whom the Israelis installed to run their client militia.

At the United Nations, when Secretary General Javier Perez de Cuellar was told of the situation, he immediately called Israeli Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin, who was in New York, and asked for Israel’s intervention on behalf of the Finnish troops.

The United Nations, which sent the 5,000-man peacekeeping force into southern Lebanon in 1978, has never recognized SLA authority in the area and publicly holds Israel responsible for the acts of the militia.

Region of Overlap

In fact, Friday’s incident took place in a region where the Israeli security zone overlaps the area patrolled by UNIFIL.

The incident comes at a time when Israel is delaying its long-scheduled final withdrawal from Lebanon, which it invaded three years ago. The delay is said to be occurring, in part, because the Israelis have lost confidence in the South Lebanon Army’s ability to maintain the buffer zone.

One diplomat involved in trying to push Israel to pressure the SLA said, “We told them that they had better put an end to this mess and get their (SLA) boys under control or lose what little backing they have for what they’ve done in Lebanon.”

There have been numerous confrontations involving UNIFIL, Israel, Amal and various other forces contending for control in the region. More than 100 U.N. soldiers have died since 1978, mostly in incidents involving Lebanese forces.

Military sources in Tel Aviv said Maj. Gen. Ori Orr, the head of Israel’s Northern Command, had answered a request for help from UNIFIL’s Gen. Callaghan by saying he would “attempt to obtain the release (of the U.N. troops) if UNIFIL would attempt to obtain the release of the 11 SLA men.”

Wire services reported these other developments in Lebanon:

--In Beirut, factional fighting claimed eight lives, and a newspaper reported that Syria and Lebanon had agreed to form a 5,000-man “strike force” to restore peace to the capital.

The independent Daily Star quoted Cabinet minister Joseph Hashem as saying the force would re-establish security in Beirut, dismantle the Green Line dividing the Muslim and Christian sectors of the city and collect heavy weapons from militias.

--Austrian Ambassador George Zmidaric and Robert Gallagher, director of the U.N. Relief and Works Administration, and two other persons were forced to take refuge in the besieged Palestinian camp at Borj el Brajne by armed Shia Muslim women but were later allowed to leave unharmed.