<h6><strong>Eduardo González</strong></h6> <h4><strong>The Minister of Defense, Margarita Robles, begins next Monday a two-day trip to Lebanon in which she will visit the Spanish contingent of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) and will meet with the newly appointed president of the country, General Joseph Aoun, and his Lebanese counterpart, Maurice Sleem.</strong></h4> The Minister of Defense will travel next Monday to the ‘Miguel de Cervantes’ base, in Marjayoun, where there are nearly 700 Spanish soldiers, who constitute one of the most important contingents of UNIFIL. The visit takes place just one month after the last change in the contingent. On Tuesday, the Minister of Defense will hold a meeting with her Lebanese counterpart and with President Aoun. This is Robles' first trip in 2025 on a mission abroad and occurs just one week before the end of the ceasefire agreed on November 27 by Israel and the Lebanese Shiite militia Hezbollah. Spain's participation in UNIFIL began in September 2006, as part of Operation 'Libre Hidalgo', deploying its military in southern Lebanon, with the aim of contributing to the implementation of United Nations Resolution 1701. Since then, the Spanish Armed Forces have led the Eastern Sector of the mission from the 'Miguel de Cervantes' base. At this base, Robles will be able to share the work routine with the soldiers of the 'Guzmán El Bueno' Brigade, who have five months of mission ahead of them, and will be informed first-hand about the situation in the Eastern Sector of the 'Blue Line' after the ceasefire agreed on November 27. The Spanish contingent is made up of almost 700 men and women. To these we must add some 200 from Serbia, El Salvador and Brazil. All of them form the BRILIB XLII and together with the battalions of India, Indonesia and Nepal, they make up the UNIFIL Multinational Brigade East, under the command of the general in charge of the BRILIB XLII, Brigadier General Fernando Ruiz Gómez, with more than 3,500 peacekeepers of eight different nationalities. According to the Ministry of Defense, patrols are carried out in the Spanish brigade's Area of Operations on an uninterrupted basis and throughout the entire area every day of the week, on foot and in armored vehicles, many of them in coordination with the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF). Cooperation activities between the LAF and UNIFIL within the framework of strategic dialogue are currently focused on the redeployment and occupation of former Lebanese Armed Forces positions in the UNIFIL area of operations. Robles' trip comes five days after the official visit to Beirut by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, who was received by Joseph Aoun; by the Prime Minister-designate of Lebanon, Nawaf Salam; by the acting Prime Minister, Najib Mikati; by his counterpart from Lebanon, Abdallah Bou Habib; and by the President of the Parliament of this country, Nabih Berri. During this visit, Albares announced a Spanish contribution of ten million euros, channelled by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), to meet the needs of the Lebanese Army in the new phase that the country is facing and to help Lebanese troops return to the south of the country and rebuild civilian infrastructure bombed by Israeli troops between September and December 2024. In fact, Albares also met last week in Lebanon with Spanish General Aroldo Lázaro, commander-in-chief of UNIFIL, with whom he discussed “the situation on the ground in southern Lebanon” and to whom he conveyed Spain's support “for the work of UNIFIL and recognition of the Spanish contingent”.
