Hezbollah Foreign Relations - Position of The UN

Position of The UN

UN Security Council Resolution 1559, calls for "the disbanding and disarmament of all Lebanese and non-Lebanese militia", echoing the Taif Agreement that ended the Lebanese Civil War, but does not explicitly include Hezbollah although Kofi Annan has advanced this interpretation. The Lebanese Government and Hezbollah dispute the application of this resolution to Hezbollah, referring to it as a "resistance movement" and not a militia. Israel has lodged complaints about Hezbollah's actions with the UN.

The UN's Deputy Secretary-General, Mark Malloch Brown, contests characterisations of the Lebanese militia as a terrorist organisation in the mould of al-Qaeda. While acknowledging that “Hezbollah employs terrorist tactics,” he says that it is unhelpful to call it a terrorist organization; the United States and the international community, in his view, would do well to respect it as a legitimate political party. Brown also criticized Hizbullah when he said, "It is making no effort to hit military targets; it's just a broadside against civilian targets." On the other end of the spectrum, there are some in the United Nations who deny the that Hezbollah's military activities against civilians are terrorist in nature at all.