Militants said seeking truce in Lebanon camp war

NAHR AL-BARED, Lebanon, Aug 21 (Reuters) Islamists who have fought the Lebanese army at a Palestinian refugee camp for the past three months are seeking a truce to let their families and other civilians flee, an intermediary said today.

A spokesman for the Fatah al-Islam group, Abu Salim Taha, called the Palestinian Clerics' Association late ysterday to ask for help in arranging a ceasefire in the fighting at Nahr al-Bared camp in north Lebanon, an association member said.

Palestinian clerics have tried unsuccessfully in the past to mediate between Fatah al-Islam and the army, which demands the unconditional surrender of the al Qaeda-inspired militants.

Lebanese and Palestinians sources have estimated that between 40 and 80 civilians, mostly the wives and children of the militants, remain in the camp, which lies in ruins after weeks of tank, artillery and helicopter bombardment.

Most of the camp's 40,000 refugees fled early on in the fighting which has killed nearly 300 people, making it Lebanon's worst internal violence since the 1975-1990 civil war.

''We have always called on the militants to allow the women and children to flee. And now we have no objection to those civilians leaving the camp,'' an army source said but gave no word on the terms of a truce.

Sheikh Mohammed al-Haj of the Palestinian Clerics' Association told Reuters the group had given Fatah al-Islam the army's response and were now waiting for the militants to come back with ''numbers of civilians fleeing and the time period''.

Another Lebanese soldier was killed in Nahr al-Bared today, bringing the army's overall death toll to 141 since the conflict began on May 20, security sources said. At least 100 militants and 41 civilians have also been killed.

Fatah al-Islam split from a Syrian-backed Palestinian faction last year. It says it shares al Qaeda's ideology but has no organisational ties to Osama bin Laden's network.

The conflict has added to instability in Lebanon, where a political crisis has paralysed the government since November.

REUTERS LPB KN1645