PLO Agrees to Disband Base in South Lebanon

The PLO agreed Thursday to dismantle its only power base near Israel and ship its heavy arms abroad under a peace accord that will help Lebanese President Elias Hrawi gain control of turbulent southern Lebanon.

The pact ended four days of fighting between government forces and Palestine Liberation Organization guerrillas who refused to withdraw from hilltop strongholds, used as launch points for attacks against Israel since the early 1970s.

Hrawi hopes that curbing guerrilla activity will persuade Washington to pressure Israel to abandon its self-declared “security zone” in southern Lebanon. But Israel this week repeated its refusal to leave the area.

At least 46 people were killed and 173 wounded in the clashes beginning Monday, when the army moved in to regain authority in the south for the first time since civil war engulfed the nation in 1975.

Moments after the peace announcement was made, the guns fell silent near the Palestinian refugee camps of Ein el Hilwa and Miye ou Miye southeast of Sidon, about 25 miles south of Beirut.

“A new era has begun. The war is over,” government negotiator Abdullah Amin told reporters. “An agreement has been reached for a total solution. It has been decided that the army will move into all areas covered by the plan peacefully.”

PLO leader Yasser Arafat’s representative in Lebanon, Zeid Wehbeh, said after the four-hour meeting: “The retreat is for the common national interest and in tribute to all Lebanese nationalists.”