US envoy in Beirut for talks after Lebanon, Hezbollah approve truce draft

BEIRUT (Reuters) – U.S. envoy Amos Hochstein landed in Beirut on Tuesday for talks with officials on a truce between armed group Hezbollah and Israel, Lebanon’s state news agency said, hours after a proposal drafted by Washington won a nod from the Iran-backed group.

The visit indicates progress in U.S.-led diplomacy aimed at ending a conflict which spiralled into all-out war in late September, when Israel launched a major offensive against Iran-backed Hezbollah.

Both the Lebanese government and Hezbollah have agreed to the U.S. ceasefire proposal that was submitted in writing last week and made some comments on the content, Ali Hassan Khalil, an aide to Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, told Reuters on Monday.

There was no immediate comment from Israel.

Hezbollah endorsed its long-time ally Berri to negotiate over a ceasefire, but both it and Israel have escalated the fight as the political efforts carried on.

A diplomat familiar with the talks cautioned that details still needed to be ironed out and these could still hold up a final agreement.

Khalil said Israel was trying to negotiate “under fire”, a reference to an escalation of its bombardment of Beirut and the Hezbollah-controlled southern suburbs. “This won’t affect our position,” he said.

He declined to detail the notes that Lebanon made on the draft but said they were presented “in a positive atmosphere” and in line with U.N. Security Council Resolution 1701, which ended the last war between Hezbollah and Israel in 2006.

Its terms require Hezbollah to have no armed presence in the area between the Lebanese-Israeli border and the Litani River, which runs some 30 km (20 miles) north of the frontier.

(Reporting by Maya Gebeily, Laila Bassam and Timour Azhari; Editing by Andrew Heavens)