Syria agrees to remove border posts inside Lebanon

"They have agreed to start on Monday May 15 to remove any breach, whether it be a military position or sand berms," Bassel Hujairi, head of the municipality of Aarsal said on Wednesday.

Hujairi said the agreement was reached on Tuesday in the Syrian resort town of Bludan, northeast of Damascus, between a delegation of Lebanese officials headed by the governor of Lebanon's eastern Bekaa district, Antoine Sleiman, and Syrian counterparts.

"They will start on Monday and work progressively until they remove all the sand berms and positions in Aarsal and Ras Baalbek," said Hujairi.

"The agreement was reached after we provided them with official maps and documents which proved that the lands were Lebanese," he said.

"The two sides also agreed to work on curbing smuggling" across the porous mountainous borders, by deploying army positions and patrols on both sides, he said.

On May 2, the Lebanese government decided to ask Damascus to dismantle military positions and sand berms which Syrian border guards have erected between 3.5 kilometers (2.2 miles) and five kilometers (3.1 miles) inside Lebanese territory, along an area stretching about 40 kilometers (25 miles).

Syrian authorities had claimed that the berms were laid to curb illicit border smuggling, but Lebanese farmers complained that the berms had cut through their orchards and accused Syrian border guards of harassment.

The row over the berms comes amid tense relations between Lebanon and former powerbroker Syria since the April 2005 end of Damascus' 29-year military presence and political domination of its smaller neighbor.

Syria pulled out its troops under tremendous domestic and international pressure heightened by the February 2005 assassination of five-time Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri which has been widely blamed on Damascus.

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