Black Gold in Indebted State - III

Eslam al-Rihani

Successive Lebanese governments are charged with the negligence of oil file, particularly the government of Siniora, which not only had totally ignored the issue, but also had presented Lebanon’s fortune on a golden plate to those aspirants in its wealth! However, today’s main question is how to get out of this crisis? A high diplomatic source told Al-Manar Website that “Lebanon should immediately create a committee of experts and specialists to demarcate the Lebanese maritime borders, develop scenarios for demarcating the economic zone, and reconsider the unjust agreement signed between Siniora’s government and Cyprus. Then, the new committee should file all the outcomes to the United Nations.” CONSTITUTIONALLY INVALID Lebanon has no official obligations towards the 2007 agreement with Cyprus, which complies with Article 52 of the Lebanese constitution stating that negotiations and signing of international conventions are exclusively the responsibility of the President of the Lebanese Republic; yet, this was not the case in January 2007 . “Neither the President, nor the Prime Minister had assigned anyone to sign the agreement. Only Foad Siniora – the then resigned PM – assigned the Directorate General of Land and Marine Transport to negotiate with Cyprus,” the diplomatic source told Al-Manar. Lebanese retired Brigadier General Dr. Amin Hoteit not only agreed with that opinion, but added as well that the new cabinet of PM Miqati expressed determination to follow-up the file and ask Cyprus to re-negotiate the issue. The government however informed the Mediterranean island orally that the agreement is inconsistent with what mentioned in the Convention on the Law of the Sea, and that the parties who participated in negotiations were not specialized, in addition to the fact that the agreement hadn’t been approved in the Parliament.”Cyprus response was positive expressing readiness to re-negotiate the file. This obliges the new government not to repeat the same mistake committed by the Siniora’s via filing the issue to those who are incapable and do not have neither patriotism, nor legal and topographic expertise. NEGOTIATE OR SUE? Getting out of the marine borders crisis between Lebanon and the Zionist entity can only be through an indirect negotiation in resorting to a third part, which could be the UN, as it is the case when negotiating on prisoners. Mr. Rizk Zogheib - an expert in the international law - believed that indirect negotiation is the best solution, or else the government will be forced to resort to the arbitration before the International Court of Justice. Then, the sentence will be binding for both parties. “In this case in subject, resorting to the ICJ will (implicitly) force Lebanon to recognize the Israeli entity,” Zogheib said. “Although Israel didn’t accede to the Convention on Law of the Sea, it cannot exempt from conforming to what stated by that convention, especially because the majority of principles set by the convention are principles of customary, thus they are binding to all states,” he added. Mr. Rizk Zogheib On his part, Dr. Hoteit considered that direct negotiation “does not impose on Lebanon to recognize Israel, for we are going to deal with the United Nations, where negotiations should be based upon an agreement governing the relationship, i.e. the Armistice Agreement. This makes clear that relation between two parties is a matter of war.” The Lebanese people’s refusal of the direct negotiation refers to their recognition that this is what Israel was seeking for since 1967, in order to take action in four files: Resettlement of refugees; Water and natural resources; Re-demarcation of borders between both sides, which justifies the adherence to the term ‘Blue Line’ rather than ‘International Borders’; Affecting the Lebanese economy, thus it won’t be competitor to the Israeli economy. “Israel won’t take part in any direct negotiation without opening those files. However, it is not of Lebanon’s interest - after freeing land by force, achieving victory and imposing strategic balance on Israel – to give up its power papers and negotiate on its rights with the enemy,” Hotiet stated. Dr. Amin Hoteit OUT OF CRISIS The only way to get out of this problem is that Lebanon fulfills the obligations set by the Law of the Sea, to file later its complete papers to the United Nations. The UN in its turn will match the papers with the international convention. And once the UN approves them, Lebanon will have official and international documents. The following step will be the UN calling upon the Israelis to file their papers as well; yet, if they rejected to comply, the United Nations should recognize the Lebanese documents as a result. In this way, Lebanon will meet all obligations. However, Dr. Hotiet expressed fears that “in case Israelis file their documents, somebody in the UN may explain differently some clauses in the agreement, which meets with the Israeli desire. Then Lebanon will have no other solution than resorting to arbitration.” OIL FOR OIL FORMULA Lebanon is strong enough to protect its rights and natural resources, in case it didn’t reach the desired goals through legal means. Moreover, Lebanese resistance is wise and powerful enough to deter any rival from attacking our country’s fortunes. The formula set by Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah had certainly protected the Lebanese army and gave the cabinet enough political power to work on the file till achieving the victory. Commenting on the speeches that followed Sayyed Nasrallah’s, Hoteit noted that “seven Zionist ministers had threatened Lebanon during the last days; however, anyone of those commenting on Sayyed Nasrallah’s speech had said not a word. They work under the US control. They sell everything in this country for their American promise to stay in power.” LEBANESE CONSENSUS Hoteit pointed out that since the emergence of Resistance in 1982 till the liberation of 2000, the resistance people didn’t exceed 25% of the whole Lebanese population. “Talking about a Lebanese consensus on the resistance in past but lost today is one of the biggest lies,” he said. “However, Lebanese consensus on resistance became today 75%; yet, we still hope it will increase, in accordance with patriotic criteria.” See also: Black Gold in Indebted State - I Black Gold in Indebted State - II

Source: Website Team

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian