UNITED NATIONS, Sept 29: An Israeli air attack on a UN base in south Lebanon in July that killed four peacekeepers involved the use of a precision-guided bomb, the United Nations said on Friday.

“The UN patrol base at Khiam was struck by a 500-kg precision-guided aerial bomb,” a UN statement said after a UN board enquiry submitted its report on the incident to UN chief Kofi Annan.

“The Board of Enquiry notes that the Israeli authorities have accepted full responsibility for the incident and apologised to the UN for what they say was an ‘operational level’ mistake,” it added.

The killing of the four UN observers — an Austrian, a Canadian, a Finn and a Chinese man — had drawn strong condemnation by Mr Annan.

The air strike occurred during the 34-day conflict in July and August between Israel and the Hezbollah militia, based in southern Lebanon.

The statement said the board of enquiry did not have access to operational or tactical level IDF (Israeli Defence Forces) commanders involved in this incident and ‘was therefore unable to determine why the attacks on the UN position were not halted despite repeated demarches to the Israeli authorities from UN personnel, both in the field and at headquarters’.

The UN probe concluded that ‘all standard operating procedures were followed and no additional actions could have been taken by UN personnel that would have changed the outcome’.—AFP