European legislators on Thursday branded the radical Lebanese Hizbollah group a “terrorist” organization and urged EU governments to place the group on their terrorist blacklists, as the bloc did with the Palestinian Hamas group in 2003.

“[EU] Parliament considers that clear evidence exists of terrorist activities by Hizbollah. The [EU] Council should take all necessary steps to curtail them," legislators said in a non-binding resolution adopted during a session in Strasburg, France on Thursday. EU lawmakers also called on Syria to withdraw its troops and intelligence services from Lebanon.

EU countries are under pressure from the US administration and Israel to add the Iranian-backed Hizbollah organization to its list of outlawed terrorist organizations, obliging member states to seize its assets and take action against its members.

So far, France, Spain, and Britain have been reluctant to include Hizbollah on the list, fearing that such a move would further damage the prospects for Middle East peace talks.

Hizbollah, a mainly Shi'ite Muslim radical movement, has broad popular support, notably in south Beirut and southern Lebanon. It has several elected members of the Lebanese parliament and maintains welfare services as well as an armed militia. It became the main resistance force against the Israeli occupation of Lebanon between 1982 and 2000, when the Jewish state withdrew unilaterally.

Hizbollah continues to launch occasional attacks on Israeli forces in a disputed area known as the Shebaa Farms, which Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 Middle East War but which Lebanon claims as part of its territory. The Israelis accuse the group of training and launching Palestinian suicide attackers in the West Bank and Gaza.

In related news, Washington has refuted a story in the New York Times earlier this week, according to which the US was softening its stance towards Hizbollah and might be ready to recognize it as a legitimate political party in Lebanon. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Thursday that the US stance towards Hizbollah had not changed and that the administration of US President George Bush would accept a political role for Hizbollah only if it disarmed. Rice said that did not reflect a shift in Washington’s stance, but it did reflect recognition of the political clout of the militant Shi’ite Muslim organization in Lebanon.

In remarks to reporters, Rice carefully avoided the stock US phrase that Hizbollah is a terrorist organization. Her statements come two days after Hizbollah showed its political power by drawing hundreds of thousands of people to central Beirut for a pro-Syrian rally to counter the effect of two weeks of anti-Syrian rallies following the 14 February assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik al-Hariri.

Rice said US policy was focused on getting Syria to withdraw its estimated 14’000-16’000 troops and its intelligence personnel from Lebanon so the country could hold parliamentary elections in May without outside interference.

Two days ago, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan urged the international community to understand that Hizbollah was a force to be reckoned with in implementing the UN Security Council resolution calling for the withdrawal of Syrian forces from Lebanon and the disarming of all militia groups. “[W]e need to recognize that they are a force in society that one will have to factor in as we implement the resolution,” Annan said.

(By Ekrem Krasniqi in Brussels)