A roadside bomb blew up a United Nations vehicle near the southern Lebanese port city of Sidon today, wounding five French peacekeepers.
"It was a roadside bomb that hit a UN troop carrier on a bridge in Sidon," a Lebanese security official said. Footage from the scene showed two wounded peacekeepers standing near the vehicle, one with a bandage covering one of his eyes and another with a small bandage on his neck. The vehicle was slightly burnt and its mounted gun was on the ground.
The Defence Forces said no Irish personnel were involved in the incident. In June, 400 Irish troops from the 104th Battalion left for peacekeeping duties in Lebanon.
A similar attack to today's near Sidon in May wounded six Italian peacekeepers, prompting Italy to look into reducing its peacekeeping contingent in Lebanon.
In June 2007, a car bomb killed six members a Spanish battalion attached to the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (Unifil) in south Lebanon. Nobody has been charged with that attack. The Spanish government has said it suspects al-Qaeda-inspired Islamist militants were behind the bombing.
Unifil, which is made up of 35 nations, has about 12,000 troops and naval personnel in Lebanon after its expansion under UN Security Council resolution 1701 that halted the 2006 Israel-Hizbullah war in southern Lebanon.
Unifil operates alongside 15,000 Lebanese army troops who are deployed in the south to keep peace near the frontier with Israel and prevent weapon transfers in an area that is a stronghold of Hizbullah militant group.
Reuters