Lebanon warns Israel on sea border move

BEIRUT: Israel's proposed maritime border with Lebanon threatens regional security, Lebanon's foreign minister said Monday, as a feud over offshore gas fields between the two enemy states deepens.

"Israel's measures have created a new point of tension in the region and threaten peace and security across this region," Foreign Minister Adnan Mansur told reporters in Beirut.

Mansur said the border as proposed by Israel cut through Lebanon's economic zone, adding his country would "turn to the United Nations".

Lebanon's president on Monday also warned Israel over the demarcation of the shared maritime border.

"President Michel Sleiman warns against any unilateral decisions Israel may take on maritime borders which would be a breach of international law, as is Israel's habit," read a statement from his office.

"Lebanon will defend its rights and resources by any and all legitimate means."

Sleiman said the issue would be up for discussion at the first meeting of Lebanon's new government, which on Thursday won a vote of confidence in parliament.

While Prime Minister Najib Mikati's government is dominated by the Shiite militant group Hezbollah, the last Western-backed Lebanese government took a similar stand in the conflict over offshore gas reserves.

Israel's cabinet on Sunday approved a map of the country's proposed maritime borders with Lebanon to be submitted for a UN opinion.

The proposed map lays out maritime borders that conflict significantly with those suggested by Lebanon in its own submission to the United Nations.

Lebanon's Energy Minister Gibran Bassil said Beirut will not give up its maritime rights, and accused Israel of "violations of (Lebanese) waters, territory and airspace, and today our oil rights."

Israel has for months been moving to develop several large offshore natural gas fields in the eastern Mediterranean, some which are shared with Cyprus, that it hopes could help it to become an energy exporter.

But its development plans have stirred controversy with Lebanon, which argues the gas fields lie inside its territorial waters.

Israel does not have officially demarcated maritime borders with Lebanon, and the two nations remain technically at war.

Iranian-backed Hezbollah in 2006 fought a deadly war with the Jewish state which destroyed most of Lebanon's major infrastructure.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2011