United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres strongly condemned the recent deadly attack on the Blue Helm mission in Lebanon. According to Guterres’ spokesperson, the Secretary-General voiced his condemnation of the incident that occurred on Saturday, during which one French soldier was killed and three others were injured.
Preliminary estimates from the UNIFIL peacekeeping force suggest that the troops came under fire from non-state actors, believed to be Hezbollah. This attack reportedly took place while they were investigating a location where alleged improvised explosive devices had been planted on a road situated between two United Nations positions in the deployment area in South Lebanon. This marks the third such incident in recent weeks that has resulted in the death of a peacekeeper assigned to UNIFIL, and it occurred despite a ten-day ceasefire announced on April 16th.
Guterres called upon all parties to respect a cessation of hostilities and to cease firing. Furthermore, he demanded adherence to international law obligations, stressing the need to guarantee the safety of UN personnel and the inviolability of UN property and assets at all times. Attacks on peacekeeping forces must immediately stop.
