Baku, TurkicWorld
Israel said on Tuesday it had agreed to hold talks to demarcate its border with Lebanon, adding it would release five Lebanese detainees held by the Israeli military in what it called a "gesture to the Lebanese president", TurkicWorld reports citing Al-Awsat.
A statement by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said Israel had agreed with Lebanon, the US and France to establish working groups to discuss the demarcation line between the two countries.
US Deputy Special Envoy for the Middle East Morgan Ortagus said Tuesday that Washington was seeking a political solution to persistent border disputes between Israel and Lebanon.
"We want to get a political resolution, finally, to the border disputes," Ortagus told Lebanese TV channel Al-Jadeed. "When it comes to the border agreement, the land border agreement, there are 13 points -- I think that six are still problematic."
Though Israel has largely withdrawn from southern Lebanon under a ceasefire deal agreed in November, its troops continue to hold five hilltop positions in the area with airstrikes in southern Lebanon citing what it described as Hezbollah activity.
The ceasefire deal ended more than a year of conflict between Israel's military and Lebanese armed group Hezbollah that was playing out in parallel with the Gaza war.
The fighting peaked in a major Israeli air and ground campaign that uprooted more than a million people in Lebanon and left the Iranian-backed Hezbollah badly weakened, with most of its military command killed in Israeli strikes.
