Progress in Hezbollah-Israel prisoner talks

By Nadim Ladki

BEIRUT (Reuters) - U.N.-sponsored indirect talks between Israel and Hezbollah over a prisoner exchange have made major progress, Lebanese political sources said on Monday.

A German mediator held talks with officials of Hezbollah in Beirut last week and a breakthrough appeared close. The sources gave no further details, the sources said.

Commenting on the report, an Israeli security source in Jerusalem said: "There is progress in the talks. We have been seeing developments since the early part of this month." The source did not elaborate.

Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, in a speech marking the eighth anniversary of Israel's withdrawal from south Lebanon, reiterated his vow that all Lebanese prisoners, including the long-held Samir Qantar, would be released soon.

"Very soon Samir and Samir's brothers will be among you in Lebanon," he told a crowd of tens of thousands via a video link.

The secretive negotiations are designed to secure the release of two Israeli soldiers in return for Lebanese and Arab prisoners.

Israeli military reservists Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser were captured by Hezbollah guerrillas in a cross border raid on July 12, 2006, which prompted a 34-day war between Israel and Hezbollah.

Qantar, 46, who took part in a 1979 raid that killed two Israeli men and a four-year-old girl, is the longest serving of at least six Lebanese prisoners in Israel.