MOSCOW, March 24. /TASS/. In its contacts with the Lebanese authorities, the Russian side calls for taking measures to prevent the country from slipping into a civil war, Russian Ambassador to Lebanon Alexander Rudakov said.

"We, as the Russian Federation, in our contacts with all representatives of the Lebanese establishment, call first of all for preventing potential slipping into a civil war. As for the external factor, naturally, maximal efforts are needed to strengthen the role of the Lebanese army. So that from what it is now, it becomes a more stable part of political society that would be able to defend Lebanon from any external shocks, any external aggression," he said in an interview with Vesti.

"A civil war, which lasted for 15 years and claimed hundreds of thousands of lives, is the red line that is not to be crossed. It must be prevented not to provoke another spiral that will be in the interests of external players who want to use the internal conflict to deprive a party of its legitimacy, as they do in many countries," he added.