Three more SLA men killed

At least three pro-Israeli militiamen were killed and four wounded yesterday, when Hizbullah guerrillas detonated an explosive-packed vehicle beside the Aramta outpost on the Lebanese-Israeli border.

The attack took place under covering mortar and artillery fire on a dozen fortified compounds in Israel's occupation zone, wounding an Israeli soldier. Militia headquarters in the town of Merjayoun and a post manned by Indian peacekeepers at Ibl el-Saqi were hit.

Israel responded by launching air raids and shelling the area north of the zone.

Yesterday's incident raises this year's toll among South Lebanon Army (SLA) militiamen to 21 fatalities and 30 wounded. Seven Israeli soldiers have died and 23 have been injured.

Hizbullah has stepped up military pressure on Israeli forces since early this month when the Prime Minister, Mr Ehud Barak, received cabinet approval for a unilateral withdrawal from Lebanon by July 7th.

This escalation occurred while the UN envoy, Mr Terje Larsen, was holding discussions in Jerusalem with Israeli and locally-based UN officials on the role to be played by peacekeepers in south Lebanon once Israel pulls back across the international border.

Mr Larsen, who is expected to recommend the expansion of the force from its current strength of 4,500 to 7,000, is also due to visit Beirut, Damascus and Cairo.

The SLA casualties can only accelerate collapse of morale in the militia, which is reeling from a series of heavy blows beginning with the assassination by Hizbullah of the commander of the western sector, Col Aql Hashem, on January 30th. The 2,500-man force has been recruited, trained, financed and armed by Israel since its creation in 1976.

But the SLA's future became uncertain when Mr Barak, pledging to pull out of Lebanon, was elected last May.

Beirut has tried senior SLA commanders in absentia and sentenced them to death, while rank-and-file members face the charge of treason if they fall into the hands of the Lebanese authorities. Last month Hizbullah executed an SLA security agent, demonstrating that it was prepared to give no quarter.

While France has offered refuge to SLA commanders, Israel is reluctant to take in the men and their families.