Two missiles hit a UN facility housing soldiers from the West African country on Friday, injuring four troops, officials said
Ghana has urged the international community to condemn a missile attack that injured four of its soldiers serving with the UN peacekeeping mission in southern Lebanon. The strike on Friday came amid escalating cross-border fighting between Israel and Hezbollah.
Speaking at a Commonwealth Foreign Affairs Ministers meeting in London on Sunday, Ghana’s foreign minister, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, described the bombing as “an attack on multilateralism” and “every principle that the UN Charter exists to defend.”
“We urge the Commonwealth to roundly condemn this attack and to demand immediate investigations,” Ablakwa said, according to state-owned daily Graphic Online.
The Ghana Armed Forces said two missiles hit the headquarters of the Ghana Battalion in the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), about seven minutes apart “as a fallout of the current ongoing IDF and Hezbollah exchanges in Southern Lebanon.”
The army initially reported that two soldiers were severely wounded and another was “traumatized.” In a later statement on Sunday, however, it said four personnel had been wounded – three with minor injuries and one who is recovering after surgery.
Exclusive footage captures Ghana Armed Forces officers in Lebanon battling a fierce blaze that engulfed their UNIFIL battalion headquarters in southern Lebanon after two missile strikes amid ongoing Israel-Hezbollah clashes.
“All injured soldiers are currently in stable condition,” the army stated, adding that “14 officers whose accommodation were completely burnt down have since been… provided some support.”
Israel has been carrying out airstrikes on Lebanon in retaliation for rocket strikes on the Jewish state by Hezbollah, which in turn was responding to the assassination of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in US-Israeli strikes.
The Ghanaian Foreign Ministry formally protested to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on March 6, demanding that those responsible for the attack on the UN installations be identified and held accountable for the attack.
Guterres condemned the strike, saying the safety and security of UN personnel and property “must be respected at all times.”
UNIFIL was created in 1978 to assist the Lebanese government in restoring its authority and cessation of hostilities after Israel’s invasion of southern Lebanon. As of February 1, the mission has 7,538 peacekeepers from 48 troop-contributing countries, according to UN figures. Ghana, with 624 personnel, is currently the largest African contributor to the force.
The mission has warned that any attack on its peacekeepers “may amount to a war crime.”
