Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The advice I have received is that there has not been a dramatic change of circumstances in southern Lebanon. There was a very significant and serious exchange between Hezbollah and the Israeli defence forces, but there has been no other incident since. My interest is in ensuing Irish troops are safe and that the UNIFIL mission generally is as safe as it can be and performs its role of maintaining relative stability and peace on the Israeli-Lebanese border. It has been very effective in doing this in the last couple of years. This was a significant breach which had tragic consequences for a Spanish soldier. We extend our condolences to his family and the Spanish armed forces. We should not necessarily infer from this, however, that there has been a dramatic change in southern Lebanon. I agree with the Deputy that what is happening in Syria spills over, has consequences and is incredibly complicated in terms of how we can or should respond from a peacekeeping point of view. We can only continue to observe developments and respond as best we can. That is exactly what we are doing.

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