An Uber driver with a criminal record has been arrested over the murder of a British embassy worker in Lebanon, who was believed to have been sexually assaulted and strangled.

Rebecca Dykes, 30, who had been working for the Department of International Development, was found dead by the side of a highway leading out of Beirut on Saturday.

A postmortem suggested she had been been strangled with a rope and police sources told the Telegraph she had been sexually assaulted.

The man, identified as Lebanese national Tarek H., was arrested at 3am on Monday morning at his apartment, according to security sources.