Doina Chiacu, Reuters

Saudi Arabia said on Thursday it was ready to participate in any ground operations in Syria if the U.S.-led alliance decides to start such operations, an adviser to the Saudi defence minister said.

"The kingdom is ready to participate in any ground operations that the coalition (against Islamic State) may agree to carry out in Syria," Brigadier General Ahmed Asseri, who is also the spokesman for the Saudi-led Arab coalition in Yemen, told the Saudi-owned al-Arabiya TV in an interview.

Asseri said Saudi Arabia had been an active member of the U.S.-led coalition that had been fighting Islamic State in Syria since 2014, and had carried out more than 190 aerial missions.

He said Saudi Arabia, which has been leading Arab military operations against the Iran-allied Houthis in Yemen, believed that to win against Islamic State, the coalition needed to combine aerial operations with ground operations.

The U.S. embassy in Prague on Thursday blasted a decision by the Czech Republic's justice minister not to extradite a Lebanese national to the U.S. to face weapons charges.

The move came on the same day that five Czech citizens who went missing in Lebanon in July returned home, leading to speculation that the Czech government did a deal for their release.

Prague's Municipal Court allowed the extradition of Ali Taan Fayad, also known as Ali Amin, and two citizens of Ivory Coast last year but Justice Minister Robert Pelikan has the final say and on Thursday refused to extradite them.

The three were arrested in Prague 2014 while allegedly trying to sell weapons to undercover U.S. law enforcement agents who pretended to be from a Colombian terrorist group.

"We are dismayed by the Czech government decision to release Ali Fayad and Khaled El Merebi," the embassy said in a statement.

Jeff Desjardins, Visual Capitalist

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Lebanon has weathered five years of Middle Eastern turmoil remarkably well but its stability should not be taken for granted and it needs long-term financial help to cope with a huge number of Syrian refugees, a senior U.N. official said.

U.N. Special Coordinator for Lebanon Sigrid Kaag, speaking before a Syria donors' conference in London, said on Wednesday that the refugee crisis must be recognized as long-term and the response must move beyond meeting humanitarian needs.

"Our big message is really the need for sustainable, long-term predictable financing, and very much a focus on not only humanitarian but also what we call stabilization support ... job creation," Kaag told Reuters.