Army routs militants in Lebanese refugee camp

Published on Monday 3 September 2007 00:04

LEBANESE troops yesterday seized control of a Palestinian refugee camp where they had been battling militants for more than three months, killing at least 31 fleeing fighters, security sources said.

Thirty-four more fighters from the Fatah al-Islam group were captured, 23 inside the Nahr al-Bared camp in northern Lebanon. Most were wounded.

"The battle is over. The Lebanese army has seized the last positions of Fatah al-Islam in the camp," a senior security source said.

"Most of the terrorists were killed today. The others have been captured. A few might have escaped but the army is hunting them down," the source added.

The fate of Shaker al-Abssi, the group's Palestinian leader, was unclear.

The fighting has been Lebanon's worst internal violence since the 1975-1990 civil war, killing more than 300 people.

Five soldiers were killed on Sunday, raising the army death toll to 157. At least 131 militants and 42 civilians have been killed. The army had initially estimated that only 35 active fighters remained in the camp before Sunday, along with the wounded. An army statement said the militants had tried to escape from the camp in the early hours of the morning.

At least three gunmen from outside the camp had also attacked an army position to help the fighters escape.

Most of the camp's 40,000 residents fled to a nearby Palestinian refugee camp in the early days of fighting, which erupted on 20 May when the army says Fatah al-Islam attacked its positions near the northern city of Tripoli.

Fatah al-Islam split from a Syrian-backed Palestinian faction last year. The Sunni Islamist group includes Lebanese, Saudi and Syrian fighters. It shares al-Qaeda's ideology but has no ties to the network.

The militants had put up fierce resistance, managing to inflict casualties on the army despite aerial and artillery bombardment.