Peacekeepers of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) attend the repatriation ceremony for Irish soldier Sean Rooney who was killed on a UN patrol, at Beirut international airport on December 18, 2022. (Credit: ANWAR AMRO / AFP)
BEIRUT — The body of an Irish peacekeeper serving with the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), who shot dead on Wednesday in South Lebanon, was transported on Sunday from a hospital in Saida to the Beirut international airport for repatriation.
According to the state-run National News Agency, UNIFIL commander Gen. Aroldo Lazaro Saenz arrived Sunday afternoon at the Beirut airport to attend a farewell ceremony in honor of the soldier — an event organized in cooperation with the Lebanese Army. Following the ceremony, the body will be repatriated to Ireland, where a military funeral will be held.
According to images from AFP and Reuters, a convoy of Irish UNIFIL soldiers was seen in the afternoon carrying the soldier's remains from a hospital in Sidon to Beirut.
Irish soldiers, on Dec. 18, 2022 in Saida, near a vehicle carrying the remains of their compatriot killed on Wednesday in southern Lebanon. (Credit: Mahmoud Zayyat/AFP)
"Sean Rooney made the hardest sacrifice a soldier can do: giving his life while serving lasting peace in Lebanon," UNIFIL commander Major General Aroldo Lazaro Saenz said.
Dozens of peacekeepers wearing blue berets as well as Lebanese soldiers paid respects as Rooney's coffin -- draped in both Irish and UN flags -- was carried onto a plane by comrades in the capital Beirut, according to AFP.
The soldier Sean Rooney was killed on Wednesday in the village of al-Aaqbiya, while he was part of a convoy of two armored vehicles that came under "small arms fire" on its way to Beirut with eight people on board, according to the Irish Defense Forces. The 23-year-old peacekeeper was shot in the head when seven bullets pierced the vehicle carrying him, a Lebanese judicial source told AFP on Thursday afternoon.
Caretake Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati and the commander in chief of the Lebanese Army, Joseph Aoun, promised Friday to "punish" those involved in this attack.
According to witnesses interviewed by AFP, the vehicle in which the Rooney was traveling was intercepted by residents of al-Aaqbiya. According to them, tensions preceded the attack. But a Lebanese judicial source assured AFP on Friday that no altercation between the residents and UNIFIL had taken place before the attack and that reports that the UNIFIL car had hit a villager were unfounded. According to a Lebanese judicial source, seven bullets pierced the car, one of which killed the driver. Three other soldiers were injured when the vehicle hit a pylon. The same judicial source told AFP on Friday that the Lebanese security services were still looking for the perpetrators of the attack, indicating that "two people opened fire on the vehicle."
A spokesman for the Irish armed forces told AFP that a team including military police investigators would travel to Lebanon on Saturday. Irish Foreign and Defense Minister Simon Coveney had promised on Thursday that there would be three investigations into the incident: one by Ireland, another by the UN and a third by Lebanon.
Attacks on UNIFIL soldiers are not unusual during patrols in southern Lebanon, although they rarely result in casualties. This is the first time a UNIFIL soldier has been killed since January 2015, when a Spanish soldier was shot by the Israeli army during an escalation of violence between Israel and Hezbollah on the southern border.
