Battles rage at Lebanon camp, 4 soldiers die

NAHR AL-BARED, Lebanon, July 12 (Reuters) Al Qaeda-inspired militants killed four Lebanese soldiers today in fierce battles at a Palestinian refugee camp in north Lebanon, security sources said.

They said another nine soldiers were wounded in the Nahr al-Bared camp fighting that began in the early morning after Fatah al-Islam snipers shot dead two soldiers, prompting Lebanese troops to unleash barrages of artillery fire.

The army and Fatah al-Islam militants have battled at the coastal Nahr al-Bared camp for nearly eight weeks. At least 210 people have been killed, making it Lebanon's worst internal violence since the 1975-1990 civil war.

Security and political sources said yesterday the army, concerned about being sucked into a war of attrition, had decided to mount an all-out assault on the camp to root out the militants, who have defied demands that they surrender.

But a military statement denied today's fighting was a final push, saying the operations ''are still in the framework of tightening the noose on the gunmen to force them to surrender and submit to justice''.

Witnesses said the army was bombarding the camp, often at a rate of 7 to 10 artillery shells per minute. Black smoke billowed from the camp's battered buildings, most of which have been reduced to rubble. Lebanese navy gunboats also took part in the shelling.

Bulldozers cleared the rubble and soldiers erected barricades at the camp's edges, creating fortified army positions. Security sources said a Lebanese civilian was killed by a stray bullet a few kilometres away from the camp.

POLITICAL CRISIS Today's fighting was the most ferocious since the Lebanese defence minister declared on June 21 that all major combat operations had ceased at Nahr al-Bared after the army seized all the militants' posts on its outskirts.

A 1969 Arab agreement banned Lebanese security forces from entering Palestinian camps. The agreement was annulled by the Lebanese parliament in the mid 1980s but the accord effectively stayed in place.

At least 91 soldiers, 75 militants and 44 civilians have been killed in fighting with Islamist militants in the camp and other areas since May 20.

The violence has further undermined stability in Lebanon, where a paralysing eight-month-old political crisis has been compounded by bombings in and around Beirut. The country has yet to recover from a war between Israel and Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas which erupted exactly a year ago.

Lebanese judiciary authorities charged three more Fatah al-Islam detainees, a Lebanese, an Algerian and a Tunisian, bringing to about 40 the total number of suspected militants accused of terrorism. The charge carries the death penalty.

The government says Fatah al-Islam is a tool of Syria, a charge Damascus and the militants deny. The group says it has no organisational ties with al Qaeda, but supports its ideology.

Some of its members -- mainly Lebanese, Palestinians, Syrians and Saudis -- have fought in Iraq. Security sources say at least 10 Saudis are among the dead militants.

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