Kofi Annan: Stop the Blockade in Lebanon and Release the Two Captured Sodiers

Lebanon
United Nations chief Kofi Annan visited Lebanon during the weekend and has called on Israel to lift its blockade of Lebanon and urged Hezbollah to free two captured Israeli soldiers.

Speaking after talks in Beirut, he said he was working for an immediate end to the sea and air blockade and the troops should be handed over to the Red Cross.

The Lebanese prime minister said he and Mr Annan discussed the issue of Lebanese prisoners held in Israel, as well as Shebaa Farms - territory held by Israel but claimed by Lebanon with Syria's support.

Discussions also focused on the deployment and role of 15,000 UN peacekeepers in Lebanon. Unifil-2, a force of 15,000 soldiers, including 7,000 from European Union states to replace the existing small Unifil contingent, is due to be deployed to maintain the fragile ceasefire.

UN Troop Pledges
France - leadership and 2,000 troops
Italy - 2,000 - 3,000 troops
Bangladesh - two battalions (up to 2,000 troops)
Malaysia - one battalion
Spain - one mechanised battalion
Indonesia - one battalion, an engineering company
Nepal - one battalion
Denmark - at least two ships
Poland - 500 troops
Finland - 250 troops
Belgium - 302 troops, later rising to 392
Germany - maritime and border patrols but no combat troops
Norway - 100 soldiers

The UN hopes to have some of the troops on the ground within a week, although the EU says it will be two to three months before the whole force is deployed.

Later, Hezbollah supporters booed Mr Annan as he toured southern Beirut, a stronghold for the Shia movement which was heavily bombarded during the Israeli offensive.

He is not the only leader to be hated. Tony Blair has been warned not to come to Lebanon. People there are very disappointed with Blair. He has not been forgiven for standing by US President George Bush in declining to call for an early and unconditional ceasefire in the month-long conflict in Lebanon.

Whilst Mr Annan is doing his bit as UN general secretary, Civil Rights leader Jesse Jackson has also been visting Lebanon, Syria and all neighbouring countries to try and get the release of the catured soldiers. Rev. Jackson has a good record of getting captured soldiers released, in 1983 he traveled to Syria and secured the release of a captured American pilot, who was shot down on his way to bomb Syrian positions in that country. - Lets pray that Rev. Jackson has another successful misson in the Middle East and gets the two soldiers released from Hezbullah as well as the release of hundreds of Lebanese people captured by the Israelis during their illegal occupation of Lebanon from 1982-2000 - Lets not forget them!

Israel
A row of tents has been pitched in the rose garden outside the office of the Israeli Prime Minister, Ehud Olmert, in Jerusalem. For the past few days, a group of Israeli reserve soldiers has taken up camp here. They have just returned from the war in Lebanon and they are angry.

During the conflict, 117 soldiers were killed - 50 of them were reservists. Because of Israel's small population of about 6.4 million citizens, the army depends heavily on the reserves in times of war. Most reservists supported the fight against Hezbollah and were happy to do their duty in battle. But now that the war is over, they say Israel's political and military leaders were ill-prepared and indecisive during the campaign.

Israeli Prime Minster Ehud Olmert has admitted there were failures in his country's ground offensive against Hizbollah. And he has announced the start of a public inquiry into the war but rejected the option of a more powerful state investigation.