Palestinians seek end to Lebanon standoff

The brief bouts of fighting around the Nahr al-Bared camp in northern Lebanon came amid efforts to find a resolution to the eight-day-old standoff which has witnessed the bloodiest internal clashes for decades.

A soldier was lightly wounded by sniper fire from the impoverished shantytown, and the army responded by bombarding fortifications set up by fighters from the Sunni Muslim group Fatah al-Islam, a spokesman said.

The rattle of gunfire reverberated around Nahr al-Bared at least twice during the day, prompting troops to fire shells towards the northern and eastern entrances where the Islamists are entrenched, AFP correspondents said.

Hundreds of heavily armed soldiers, backed by tanks, armoured personnel carriers and machinegun-mounted jeeps, surround Nahr al-Bared where several thousand civilians remain trapped without running water, with little food and no electricity.

On the eighth day of the siege, political tensions were rising because of divisions over how to handle the standoff and a UN vote this week on the creation of a court to try suspects in the murder of ex-premier Rafiq Hariri.

Hariri was killed in a massive Beirut bomb blast in 2005 widely blamed on former powerbroker Syria, which was later forced to end nearly 30 years of military and political domination of Lebanon.

Lebanon's Western-backed ruling majority has accused Syria of stirring the troubles in the north and blamed it for a string of recent bomb attacks in a bid to block the tribunal. Damascus has denied the allegations.

Troops have kept Nahr al-Bared under siege since Fatah al-Islam attacked army targets on May 20, sparking fierce gunbattles in the camp and the nearby port city of Tripoli which have left 78 people dead.

According to UN estimates, between 3,000 and 8,000 of the 31,000 Palestinian refugees registered at Nahr al-Bared are still inside, while Prime Minister Fuad Siniora said on Sunday that 5,000 remained.

A government source said the authorities have given Palestinian groups in Lebanon "the chance to resolve the problems with Fatah al-Islam without any time restraints."

But mediation efforts were complicated on Sunday when a team of mediators came under fire when they entered the camp, according to their leader, Sheikh Mohamad al-Hajj.

"We are focusing on reaching a ceasefire in order to continue our efforts because we came under fire yesterday while inside the camp," Sheikh Hajj told AFP.

He said he was part of a three-member delegation of clerics from the Union of Palestinian Scholars which has won approval from Lebanese authorities, Palestinian factions and Fatah al-Islam to lead the mediation.

"We are still at the beginning of the mediation road, but we are determined to continue and to work as fast as possible," Hajj said.

Asked about a possible quick end to the crisis, he said: "The problem is complex and has local, regional and international dimensions."

On Monday a spokesman for the militants, Abu Salim Taha, said mediation efforts contained some "positive elements, as previous proposals were unrealistic, demanding our surrender."

Under a longstanding arrangement, the 12 refugee camps in Lebanon remain outside the control of the government and in the hands of armed Palestinian factions -- despite a UN resolution calling for the disarmament of all militias.

The fighting has been the worst since the 1975-1990 civil war, rattling the security of a country riven by political and sectarian division and still recovering from last year's war between Israel and the Shiite Muslim Hezbollah.

Siniora has vowed to crush the "terrorist phenomenon" of Fatah al-Islam but Hezbollah's powerful leader Hassan Nasrallah has warned that any storming of the camp would trigger discord.

Syria, increasingly isolated by the West over its alleged meddling in Lebanon and Iraq, has denied any links with Fatah al-Islam.

The group's Palestinian leader Shaker Abssi, who turned up in Lebanon last year after serving three years in a Syrian jail, has claimed their fight is with "Jews and Americans" and not with Lebanon.

Fatah al-Islam has a few hundred fighters of various Arab nationalities and is said to be inspired by the Al-Qaeda network of Osama bin Laden.

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