Lebanon to reconsider joining U.S.-led coalition against ISIL

Young journalists club

News ID: 5660
Publish Date: 9:39 - 04 December 2014
Tehran, YJC. Lebanese Prime Minister Tammam Salam has announced that Beirut will mull joining the so-called U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) following the coalition’s meeting in Brussels.

"Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil will examine outcomes of the Brussels meeting in order to take a decision [whether] to participate [or not],” Salam said in remarks reported Wednesday by the Lebanon-based daily An-Nahar.

The first high-level meeting of the 60-member coalition in Brussels is to be hosted on Wednesday by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry.

Salam, however, reiterated that his country’s military capabilities are limited.

"Lebanon, which participated in the launch of the coalition in Jeddah, was clear in its position that its military power is limited and therefore cannot join [the coalition] at this level,” Salam further stated in comments prior to winding up his two-day formal visit to Belgium.

He also stated that the new European Union (EU) administration "is currently focusing its efforts on finding a solution to the crisis in the region through an end to the Syrian war.”

The so-called U.S.-led coalition against the ISIL, however, consists mainly of governments that actively supported the radical militant group in its terror campaign against the Syrian government and its military forces as part of a foreign-backed scheme to topple Syrian President Bashar al-Assad from power.

Lebanon has also suffered from militancy which is a spillover of Al-Qaeda- linked insurgency in Syria.

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