The Republican Guard Brigade (Arabic: الحرس الجمهوري اللبناني | Liwāʾ al-Ḥaras al-ǧumhūrī), also known as the Presidential Guard Brigade, is a unit of the Land Component of the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF), attached to the Directorate-General of the Presidency of Lebanon.
The commander in 2005 was Brigadier General Mustafa Hamdan, who was accused of complicity in the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri in February 2005 and later released from prison without being cleared as innocent along with three other generals in April 2009.
When President Lahoud stepped down at the end of his office, the brigade was reattached to the Army General Command.
[1][2] The brigade's duties include providing escorts not only for the Lebanese President and its family, but also to the Prime-Minister and cabinet members or to foreign visiting heads-of-state, and guards-of-honour at official public acts.
They are also entrusted with guarding important public buildings in Beirut such as the Parliament House at Nejmeh Square and the nearby Grand Serail, an Ottoman-era palatial complex which houses the Prime-Minister and the Council of Ministers' offices, and the Presidential Palace itself.