Lebanon has opened a bank account for donations to help modernise its poorly-equipped army, the defence minister said Saturday, two weeks after a deadly border clash between Lebanese and Israeli soldiers. "I announce the launching of a fund to support and equip the army," the official news agency NNA quoted Elias Murr as saying.
It said the minister and his father, former defence minister Michel Murr, had deposited one billion Lebanese pounds (670,000 dollars) into an account at the central bank. Murr added that there would be a plan to communicate with the Lebanese diaspora about supporting the fund.
A week ago, following the August 3 border clash with Israel in which four people were killed, Lebanese President Michel Suleiman announced he had "launched a national, Arab and international campaign" to equip the army. His statement called on "neighbouring and friendly states to supply all kinds of arms" to allow him to defend the country.
The Lebanese military has an ill-equipped 60,000-strong army, outdated weapons and no air power. On Wednesday, Murr lashed out at a US decision to halt aid to the Lebanese military in the wake of the border clash with Israel, protesting that aid was being made conditional.
His comments came after a key US lawmaker said he had placed on hold 100 million dollars in aid to Lebanon's army and another legislator asked the Pentagon for assurances that Washington's aid was not indirectly helping Hezbollah. The US has provided about 720 million dollars in military aid to Lebanon since 2006, and the State Department has said that military co-operation with Lebanon will continue.
The exchange of fire on Lebanon's southern border killed two Lebanese soldiers and a journalist, as well as an Israeli officer. Southern Lebanon, which Israel withdrew its troops from in 2000 after a 22-year occupation, is regarded as a Hezbollah stronghold. Lebanese army forces deployed in the south after a 30-year hiatus, following the fierce 2006 war between Israel and the militant Shiite group.
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