Lebanon's Prime Minister Nawaf Salam insisted at the UN on Friday on the need to "avert the vacuum" that would be caused by withdrawing the UN peacekeeping mission deployed in the south of his country without a viable replacement.
Under US pressure, the UN Security Council decided last month to fix December as the end of the mandate of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), which has been deployed since 1978.
"What we wish to stress here and today is the need to avert the vacuum that UNIFIL's withdrawal could create, were it to take place without agreement on a new international force to replace it," Salam said in a speech to the UN General Assembly.
UNIFIL currently has 7,500 peacekeepers from around 50 countries.
They are deployed in southern Lebanon along the Blue Line, which stretches for 120 kilometers (75 miles), marking a de facto border between Lebanon and Israel.
Salam also stressed the need for Israel to fully withdraw from Lebanese territory and for Beirut to move forward in extending state authority over its entire territory, ensuring "weapons (are) held by the state alone."
Lebanese group Hezbollah has so far opposed disarmament.
Lebanon and Israel reached a US-brokered framework agreement in June, providing for the gradual withdrawal of Israeli forces and the disarmament of Hezbollah, but its implementation has stalled.
The agreement is aimed at ending decades of Israeli aggression against Lebanon while safeguarding the country’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.
