"The UK is strongly committed to Lebanon's stability… Practical UK support for Lebanon's stability has increased tenfold over the last two years. The UK Government has given over $273 million to help build stability, and to support Lebanon," the press service of the UK embassy in Lebanon told Sputnik.
"UK support to the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) is part of the UK-Lebanon five-point stability package that was announced in July 2013," the embassy explained, adding that Britain had already delivered 164 Land Rovers, 1,500 sets of body armor, a secure radio communication network, border watchtowers, and HESCO bastion ballistic protection for the LAF.
On November 30, British daily newspaper, The Telegraph, disclosed that a clandestine British team had built 12 towers along the Lebanese border with Syria to prevent Islamic State militants from advancing into the Christian town of Ras Baalbek, northern Lebanon.
The daily cited Tom Fletcher, the British ambassador to Lebanon, as saying that the watchtowers had been built to prevent a massacre at Ras Baalbek.
The Islamic State militant group has been fighting the Syrian government since 2012. In June 2014, the group, which mainly targets ethnic and religious minorities, expanded its attacks to northern and western Iraq and declared an Islamic caliphate on the territories that had fallen under its control. A US-led coalition is currently carrying out airstrikes against IS positions in Syria and Iraq.
