II UAE Armed Forces participated in UNOSOM II which was an intervention launched in March 1993 until March 1995, and committed resources to the United Nations mission. Lebanon UAE Military field engineers arrived in Lebanon at 8 September 2007 in Beirut for clearing areas of south Lebanon from mines and cluster bombs. War in Afghanistan UAE Armed Forces were deployed in 2003 to Afghanistan mainly to support construction. UAE special forces would establish fire support base around UAE supported projects which included funding tarmac roads, clinics, a Pashtun radio station and a mast provided by Etisalat which provided competition for other mobile networks in Helmand. Their activities include driving into "remote and impoverished" Afghan villages, distributing aid and sitting down with the village "elders" to inquire about their needs. They would then fund projects while the contracts went out to local tender. UAE Armed Forces used their ties to Islam and ability to fund projects to try to reduce the local suspicion of NATO in Afghanistan. Saudi led intervention in Yemen In 2015, UAE participated in the Saudi Arabian-led intervention in Yemen to influence the outcome of the Yemeni Civil War (2015–). On 4 September 2015, 52 UAE soldiers (together with 10 Saudi and 5 Bahraini soldiers) were killed when a Houthi missile hit an ammunition dump at a military base in Ma'rib Governorate, marking the "highest death toll on the battlefield in the country's history". In 2016, during the Battle of Mukalla, UAE Armed Forces liberated the port of Mukalla from AQAP forces in 36 hours after being held by AQAP for more than a year with the US defense secretary James Mattis calling the UAE led operation a model for American troops. In 2018, the Associated Press in a report mentioned that UAE struck deals with AQAP militants by recruiting them against fighting the Houthis and providing them with money. The report continued to state that the United States was aware of Al-Qaeda joining ranks with UAE and has held off drone strikes against Al-Qaeda. UAE Brigadier General Musallam Al Rashidi responded to the report by stating that Al Qaeda cannot be reasoned with in the first place stating that "There's no point in negotiating with these guys." The UAE military stated that accusations of allowing AQAP to leave with cash contradicts its primary objective of depriving AQAP of its financial strength. The notion of Al Qaeda joining