Annan painful choices needed on WASIA prisoners

UNITED NATIONS, Aug 19 (Reuters) UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan urged Israel and Lebanon to make ''painful compromises'' to secure the release of abducted Israeli soldiers and settle the issue of Lebanese prisoners in Israel.

The issue that set off the war between Israel and Hizbollah guerrillas needed to be rectified, Annan said in a status report to the UN Security Council late yesterday.

''While one of the immediate triggers of the crisis was the abduction of Israeli soldiers, their unconditional release is but one of many measures still to be taken, and painful compromises will have to be made, by both sides, in the interests of peace for the peoples of Lebanon and Israel,'' he said in the 14-page report the council discusses on Monday.

The Security Council adopted a resolution last week calling for the unconditional release of the two Israeli soldiers seized on July 12 in a cross-border raid by Hizbollah. It also urgently encouraged efforts at settling the issue of Lebanese prisoners in Israel.

Since the conflict broke out Israel has captured a number of Hizbollah fighters but Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni declined at a UN news conference on Wednesday to say if an exchange would take place ''because the issue is so sensitive.'' Annan also detailed massive relief aid the United Nations was delivering to Lebanon and help Beirut would get with reconstruction.

But in the interim, Hizbollah is handing out bundles of cash, presumably obtained from Iran, to people whose homes were demolished by Israeli bombs. Hizbollah grants of 12,000 dollars consolidated the Iranian-backed group's support among Lebanon's Shi'ites, embarrassing the Beirut government.

(LIFT BLOCKADE) To accelerate relief assistance, Annan called on Israel to lift ''the continuing sea and air blockage on Lebanon as soon as possible.'' He said ''having full and unrestricted access to all means of transportation, on the most direct route, will be critical for the successful delivery of assistance.'' Israel has maintained the blockade on most ships and aircraft, despite a fragile truce that went in effect on Monday, to prevent weapons from reaching Hizbollah.

Nearly 1 million Lebanese were displaced, about 1,200 Lebanese were recorded dead and thousands injured, the majority of them women and children, Annan said.

''The damage to essential infrastructure, residential housing, and the economy is severe. An estimated 15,000 apartments have been destroyed and 140 bridges hit,'' he said.

Echoing a briefing yesterday to the Security Council by Margareta Wahlstrom, the deputy UN relief coordinator, Annan said unexploded weapons and cluster bomblets presented a significant risk to humanitarian workers and the estimated 400,000 people returning to their homes.

The fighting has left residential areas and public buildings littered with some 8,500 unexploded mines and other munitions, resulting in ''maiming injuries and even deaths among returnees,'' Wahlstrom said.

REUTERS1201