Army to Recruit Soldiers Starting Next Week
The Army Command will recruit around 1,000 soldiers starting next week as the military is battling Islamist militants, who are entrenched on the outskirts of the northeastern border town of Arsal on the porous Syrian-Lebanese border.
An Nahar newspaper reported on Friday that another 1,000 soldiers will be recruited in January 2015.
The report comes amid the increasing defection of troops from the Lebanese army with rising fears that the institution is being targeted with a campaign to create chaos within its ranks.
The first time a Lebanese soldier defected to the Nusra Front in neighboring Syria was in July. The number has reached 5 so far.
For the past few months, the military has been coming under increasing armed attacks mainly in northern Lebanon.
Since August, the Lebanese army has been fighting militants from the Islamic State group and al-Qaida-linked al-Nusra Front near the border with Syria.
Earlier that month, the extremists crossed into Arsal from Syria, capturing soldiers and policemen. Two of the soldiers have since been beheaded and one has been killed in captivity.
The attacks against the military rose after the Arsal gunbattles.
H.K.
G.K.
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