Lebanon protesters clash with forces amid economic crisis
Calm returned to the city ater protesters tried to storm official buildings, including a branch of central bank, forcing the army to deploy; rubber bullets and shrapnel caused for some injuries
Nearly twenty people were wounded in overnight scuffles in northern Lebanon between security forces and protesters angered by a spiralling economic crisis, a medical association said on Sunday.
The protests in the city of Tripoli came as the Lebanese pound plumbed fresh lows on the black market due to a financial crisis that the World Bank says is likely to rank among the world’s worst since the mid-19th century.
Calm returned to the city on Sunday ater protesters tried to storm official buildings, including a branch of the central bank, overnight, forcing the army to deploy.
“18 people, both civilians and soldiers, were injured, including four who were hospitalised,” said the Emergency and Relief Corps, a local medical charity that dispatched ambulances to treat the wounded.
Rubber bullets and shrapnel from stun grenades accounted for some of the injuries, a spokesperson for the charity said.
The army said 10 soldiers were wounded in the Tripoli clashes, the majority in a single incident that it said involved a group of protesters on motorcycles throwing stun grenades at personnel.
The southern city of Sidon and the capital Beirut saw smaller demonstrations against the ongoing dramatic fall in living standards.
The Lebanese pound, officially pegged to the dollar at 1,507 since 1997, traded at 17,30017,500 to the dollar on the black market on Saturday -- a record low.
Some social media users said it had fallen as low as 18,000, down from 15,000 earlier in the week.
The country is also grappling with a fuel crisis that has led to seemingly endless queues at gas pumps in recent weeks.
The price of fuel is expected to rise ater the government said it would fund fuel imports at a rate of 3,900 Lebanese pounds to the dollar, instead of the official rate.
The move effectively reduces subsidies on fuel as the central bank tries to shore up fastdiminishing foreign currency reserves.
The financial collapse has sparked outrage at Lebanon’s political class, seen as woefully corrupt and unable to tackle the country’s many difficulties.
Lebanon has been without a fully functioning government since a massive blast in Beirut last summer that killed more than 200 people and ravaged swathes of the capital.
The government stepped down ater the disaster, but efforts to agree on a new cabinet have repeatedly foundered.
Dozens of angry Lebanese took to the streets of the northern city of Tripoli to denounce the depreciation and “difficult living conditions”, the National News Agency reported.
Some protesters managed to break through the gates of a branch of the central bank and enter the courtyard, the NNA said, but the army prevented them from reaching the building.
Demonstrators also set fire to the entrance of a government office, an AFP correspondent said.
Others were seen trying to force their way into the homes of two lawmakers but were stopped by security forces.
The NNA said gunshots were heard outside the house of lawmaker Mohammed Kabbara and the army intervened to disperse protesters. In the southern city of Sidon, protesters tried to storm another branch of the central bank only to be pushed back by security forces, the NNA reported. Scatered protests also took place in the capital Beirut, where a small number of protesters took to the streets and burned tyres, an AFP correspondent said.
Lebanon has been roiled since autumn 2019 by an economic crisis the World Bank says is likely to rank among the world’s worst financial crises since the mid-19th century.
The collapse has sparked outrage at Lebanon’s political class, seen as woefully corrupt and unable to tackle the country’s many difficulties.
The pound’s dizzying depreciation comes as the eastern Mediterranean country grapples with shortages of medicine and fuel which are imported from abroad using foreign currency.
The country has been without a fully functioning government since a massive blast in Beirut last summer that killed more than 200 people and ravaged swathes of the capital.