Headlines
Lebanon and Syria agree on ceasefire after deadly cross-border clashes
Published by Global Banking & Finance Review®
Posted on March 17, 2025
3 min readLast updated: January 24, 2026
Global Banking & Finance Review®
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Published by Global Banking & Finance Review®
Posted on March 17, 2025
3 min readLast updated: January 24, 2026
Lebanon and Syria have agreed on a ceasefire following deadly cross-border clashes, with 10 people killed. Both nations aim to prevent further conflict.
BEIRUT (Reuters) - Lebanon's Defence Minister Michel Menassa and his Syrian counterpart Murhaf Abu Qasra agreed on a ceasefire, the Lebanese and Syrian defence ministries said in statements on Monday, as cross-border clashes in the last two days left 10 dead.
Three soldiers in Syria's new army and seven Lebanese were killed in border clashes during the past two days, the Syrian defence ministry and Lebanese health ministry said.
On the Lebanese side, 52 people were wounded, the health ministry said.
The Lebanese and Syrian defence ministers also agreed on continuing contacts between the army intelligence directorates to prevent more deterioration on the border.
The mountainous frontier has been a flashpoint in the three months since Islamist rebels toppled Syria's Bashar al-Assad, an ally of Tehran and Iran-backed Lebanese armed group Hezbollah, and installed their own institutions and army.
Meanwhile, Lebanon's Foreign Affairs Minister Youssef Raji met his Syrian counterpart Asaad al-Shibani in Brussels to discuss the cross-border developments and agreed to maintain contacts, the Lebanese state news agency NNA reported.
Late on Sunday, Syria's defence ministry accused Hezbollah of crossing into Syrian territory and kidnapping and killing the three members of Syria's new army. Hezbollah denied any involvement.
A Lebanese security source told Reuters the three Syrian soldiers had crossed into Lebanese territory first and were killed by armed members of a tribe in northeastern Lebanon who feared their town was under attack.
Syrian troops responded by shelling Lebanese border towns overnight, according to the Syrian defence ministry and the Lebanese army.
Residents of the town of Al-Qasr, less than 1 kilometre (0.6 mile) from the border, told Reuters they fled further inland to escape the bombardment.
Lebanon's army said in a statement on Monday that it had handed over the bodies of the three killed Syrians to Syrian authorities, and that it had responded to fire from Syrian territory and sent reinforcements to the border area.
Syria's army sent a convoy of troops and several tanks to the frontier on Monday, according to a Reuters reporter along the border. Syrian troops fired into the air as they moved through towns on the way to the border.
"Large military reinforcements were brought in to reinforce positions along the Syrian-Lebanese border and prevent any breaches in the coming days," said Maher Ziwani, the head of a Syrian army division deploying to the border.
(Reporting by Maya Gebeily and Laila Bassam in Beirut and Menna Alaa El-Din and Muhammed Al Gebaly in Cairo; Editing by Howard Goller and Lisa Shumaker)
The ceasefire agreement was reached after deadly cross-border clashes that resulted in the deaths of three Syrian soldiers and seven Lebanese individuals.
According to the Lebanese health ministry, 52 people were wounded on the Lebanese side during the clashes.
Syria's defense ministry accused Hezbollah of crossing into Syrian territory and claimed that three members of Syria's new army were kidnapped and killed.
The Lebanese and Syrian defense ministers agreed to maintain contacts between their army intelligence directorates to prevent further deterioration on the border.
Syria's army sent a convoy of troops and several tanks to the frontier, with large military reinforcements brought in to strengthen positions along the Syrian-Lebanese border.
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