News in the past two months has been dominated by the situation in Lebanon. Not only is Lebanon a member state of the UNEP Regional Office for West Asia, the home of the Al-Bia Wal-Tanmia editorial team, it is also my family home. Such closeness to a situation certainly brings to you the horror of living in such conditions and I pray that you and your families are all safe and well and are looking to a hopefully better future once the UN resolutions have come to full fruition and the task of re-building can begin. Lebanon has been through such adversity before and arisen as a country welcoming guests and visitors who have hailed its history and beauty. I am confident that the same can be true once more.
But before we can look towards welcoming back the visitors who were beginning to grace Lebanese shores, we must look to the damages that have been caused, to the humanitarian and environmental response to try and re-build and strengthen both the peoples themselves and the land in which they live, and indeed, the seas from which many gain their livelihoods.
From an environmental perspective one of the major issues has been the oil spill emanating from the damaged oil storage unit at the power plant in Jiyyeh, 30 km south of Beirut. It is estimated that 10,000 to 15,000 tonnes of fuel oil has entered the Mediterranean Sea as a result of this damage. The spill itself has been closely monitored since the international community was alerted to the situation, with satellite maps and other data being studied on a regular basis by experts from within and outside the region. It is now estimated that 150km of coastline as been affected with some oil reaching as far north as Syria.
In response to this situation, and as a first stage of the environmental work that UNEP will undertake in the aftermath of the conflict, UNEP's Executive Director, Mr. Achim Steiner, convened, with Mr. Efthimios Mitropoulos, Secretary-General of the International Maritime Organization (IMO) a meeting in Athens, Greece on 17 August, hosted by the Greek Mercantile Ministry in Piraeus, to identify an action plan to assist the authorities in Lebanon with the clean up of coastal oil pollution and to prevent any damage to neighbouring countries. The International Assistance Action Plan has been prepared by the Experts Working Group for Lebanon under the supervision of UNEP-MAP's Regional Marine Pollution Emergency Response Centre for the Mediterranean Sea (REMPEC) and H.E. Eng. Yacoub Riad Sarraf, Minister of the Environment of Lebanon.
UNEP/ROWA is also working with UNEP's Post-Conflict Branch, which has had valuable experience working in both Iraq and Palestine, in developing a proposal for a Post-Conflict Assessment for Lebanon. This is being done in close cooperation with, and at the request of the Ministry of Environment. This work will assess all aspects of the environment, with a specific focus on air pollution (including from burning and the dispersal of asbestos fragments in the air), environmental and health impacts of decomposed carcasses and remains under rubble, soil and groundwater pollution, oil spills, impacts due to disruption of power supply (disposal of untreated sewage to land, river and seas and disposal of healthcare waste without incineration), impacts due to general breakdown of civil amenities (lack of collection of municipal solid waste and mixing of municipal and industrial waste), impacts associated with refugee exodus and specific impacts relating to the weapons used.
As soon as relevant security clearances are received and UNEP's team of experts mobilised, the UNEP team will enter Lebanon to provide support and technical guidance to the Ministry of Environment and its experts in assessing the damage to the environment caused by the conflict and developing an action plan for their remediation. I, myself will be part of the initial team entering Lebanon, and will be liaising closely with the Minister of Environment, with UNEP's Executive Director and with other relevant actors throughout this process. My colleagues here at the Regional Office will also be adding their expertise to that of UNEP as a whole in providing support to the Ministry to ensure that the environmental damages from this event are minimised and rehabilitated and that Lebanon can quickly and smoothly regain its strength and the beauty of its people and natural environment.
Habib El-habr regional director UNEP/ROWA
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