Lebanon accused Israel of "piracy" after its navy allegedly tried to force a Lebanese civilian cargo ship to sail to the northern Israeli port of Haifa.
"The interception of the cargo ship, the terrorism exercised against its crew and the Israeli intimidation shots were acts of terrorist piracy and constitute a violation of territorial waters," said President Emile Lahoud in a statement.
"They are also a violation of United Nations Security Council Resolution 425," which stipulated Israel's pullout from southern Lebanon and a halt to "military actions" against Lebanon.
Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri said earlier that Lebanon will file a complaint to the United Nations after the Israeli navy allegedly harassed the ship in Lebanese territorial waters.
"Lebanon will file a complaint with the United Nations to add it to other Israeli violations at the borders between the two countries," he said.
"We denounce the continued daily provocations by Israel and attempts against Lebanon's sovereignty," Hariri said in a statement.
Hariri "denounced Israeli warships for intercepting a Lebanese cargo civilian ship and harassing its crew in territorial waters, off Tyre," a coastal city in southern Lebanon.
"Such practices are part of Israeli attempts to provoke tension with Lebanon in order to divert the world's attention from its attacks on the Palestinian people in the occupied territories," he said.
The captain of the vessel Rizkallah, Tanios Rai, 38, told an AFP correspondent in Tyre that an Israeli officer spoke to him in Arabic over the radio shortly after midnight (2200 GMT) on Thursday.
Rai said that he was ordered by the officer to sail the ship out of Lebanese territorial waters.
The captain said he tried to protest, but was forced to abide by the order after the officer threatened to open fire.
Rai said two Israeli gunboats fired several bursts from machineguns and a dozen flares near the Rizkallah, which could not move because its engine had broken down in the meantime.
The captain and his four-member crew, all of them Lebanese, said they were interrogated over the radio by Israeli officers who after six hours gave up trying to force him to sail to the Israeli northern port of Haifa.
It was the first such violation since the Israeli pullout in May from southern Lebanon after 22 years of occupation during which Lebanese fishermen in the region were frequently harassed.
The Israeli air force violated Lebanese airspace 123 times between October 8 and November 8, according to the UN Interim Forces in southern Lebanon (UNIFIL), whose protests a spokesman said had gone unanswered.
Lebanon has also accused the Israeli air force for landing two helicopter gunships in a village in southern Lebanon on the night of November 5-6, considering the incident, which Israel denied, as an "act of war."
The violations began after the Lebanese Hezbollah guerrilla group captured three Israeli soldiers on the border, holding them against the release of prisoners held in Israeli jails -- BEIRUT (AFP)
© 2000 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
