Leave your feedback Share Copy URL https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/lebanese-special-envoy-tarek-mitri-calls-for-immediate-cease-fire Email Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Pinterest Tumblr Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Transcript Lebanese Special Envoy Tarek Mitri spoke to the U.N. Security Council Monday, resisting the creation of an international force in Lebanon and calling on the U.S. to press Israel for a cease-fire. On the NewsHour, Mitri discusses Lebanon's official perspective. Read the Full Transcript Notice: Transcripts are machine and human generated and lightly edited for accuracy. They may contain errors. GWEN IFILL: And now for the official Lebanese perspective. We get it from Tarek Mitri. He is a special envoy of Lebanon's Council of Ministers, or cabinet. He spoke to the United Nations Security Council yesterday about the conflict, and he joins us now.Mr. Minister, thank you for joining us.TAREK MITRI, Special Envoy of Lebanon's Council of Ministers: Thank you. GWEN IFILL: We just heard Secretary Rice give the most optimistic view of this, which is that there would be a cease-fire at the very least within a week, and yet we heard Shimon Peres talk in terms of weeks before that happens or before this conflict is over.Even tonight, we hear of a new firefight breaking out north of the Litani River. Of the optimistic viewpoint that we heard from Secretary Rice and the less optimistic viewpoint that we heard from Shimon Peres, based on what you know, where do you come down? TAREK MITRI: Well, I would like to believe the words that indicate that we're moving diplomatically. I've heard this now, but I've heard it before from a number of member states of the United Nations Security Council.Be that as it may, our country continues to be the victim of a collective punishment. The country is being destroyed. I don't know what military strategy, I don't know what the time frame that is in the minds of the Israelis, but I know that they have been destroying my country, harming the civilian population everywhere.I just heard news from Baalbek, which is northeastern part of the country, has been severely bombarded. And this is the case in many villages in the south that have been flattened — literally flattened — and this must stop.I've come here to call for an immediate cease-fire. GWEN IFILL: And what is the chance, do you think, of that happening? What kind of response have you been getting at the U.N.? Based on Secretary Rice's optimism, do you think she knows something that we ought to know? Or do you believe that, based on the events which are going on tonight, that that is increasingly out of reach? TAREK MITRI: I mean, in the Security Council, you can hear more and more people, especially after Qana, who are convinced that this cannot go on and that Israel shouldn't be given as much time as it wants to continue destroying Lebanon. We've been told that the message is heard, if I may, I mean, I we have every reason to be impatient, and we would like to have a cease-fire yesterday.