Protesters and security forces faced off in minor skirmishes in Tripoli over the weekend. (Fathi al-Masri/AFP)
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Protests continued Sunday in Tripoli over deteriorating living conditions amid the lockdown and decades of state neglect. A couple hundred demonstrators, including a group that had traveled from Beirut, gathered in the city’s Al-Nour Square in the afternoon. This largely peaceful affair turned chaotic in the evening hours as a group of demonstrators engaged in back-and-forth clashes with security forces guarding the nearby serail, the seat of the North Lebanon governorate. In Beirut, a group of demonstrators blocked the Ring Road in anger over the arrest of an activist who took part in a protest march Saturday night in the capital to the second homes of Tripoli MPs; the group plans to protest again today at 9 a.m. in Ramlet al-Baida.
Lebanon enters the potential last week of the now 18-day-old lockdown after registering 112 new deaths over the weekend. While new infections have dropped, albeit with less testing, the number of patients in intensive care units remains at all-time highs as doctors caution the country is not out of the woods yet. Caretaker Health Minister Hamad Hassan said Saturday any decision to potentially extend the lockdown was up to the COVID-19 ministerial committee. For his part, the head of the parliamentary health committee suggested that the closure’s success could not be effectively evaluated before Saturday, two days before the lockdown is set to expire.
As authorities gear up for a COVID-19 inoculation campaign, the COVAX vaccine program notified Lebanon it would dispatch doses by the end of the month. Hamad Hassan tweeted Saturday that the World Health Organization-led program sent official notice that the first shipment of AstraZeneca vaccines would arrive in the last week of February; however, he did not specify how many doses would be sent. The government’s vaccination scheme envisions Pfizer inoculations starting to arrive in mid-February, with about 2.1 million doses — enough for a little over 1 million people — expected by year’s end. Another 2.7 million doses have been secured via COVAX, leaving the government needing millions more if it is to achieve its goal of vaccinating 70 percent of the population by the end of 2021. However, only 174,000 people have registered to receive the COVID-19 vaccine so far, Hassan said Sunday night.
Michel Murr, a career politician whose family owns a media conglomerate, died Sunday as a result of COVID-19 complications. In his late 80s, Murr was Lebanon’s oldest serving MP after winning re-election in 2018 in the Metn district. During a career spanning six decades, Murr served more than six terms as MP while holding several positions in successive governments. Most notably, he served as defense minister from 1990 until 1992 in the governments of Omar Karami and Rachid Solh before holding the interior ministry portfolio four times under Rafik Hariri and Salim El-Hoss.
The Special Tribunal for Lebanon will hold a hearing Wednesday on its case regarding 2004-05 attacks linked to the Rafik Hariri assassination. The status conference aims at “ensuring the expeditious preparation for trial” of Salim Ayyash on charges of the murder of Communist Party leader George Hawi and attempted murders of ex-ministers Elias Murr and Marwan Hamade. The tribunal has determined that these three attacks are connected to the Feb. 14, 2005, bombing that killed former Premier Rafik Hariri and 21 others. On Dec. 11, the STL sentenced Ayyash, who is affiliated with Hezbollah, to life in prison for Hariri’s assassination; three others were found not guilty in the case. Ayyash remains at large.
An investigating judge plans to start hearings this week in a case against the central bank governor, who is charged with dereliction of duty and breach of trust. Judge Nicolas Mansour will study the case file against Riad Salameh, Banking Control Commission chief Maya Dabbagh and two money exchangers, the NNA reported, without specifying what days this week he will depose the defendants. A judicial source told AFP that the investigation is focused on the misuse of over $5 million doled out by Banque du Liban to subsidize food imports.
Thursday marks six months since the devastating Aug. 4 Beirut port explosion that killed over 200 people, injured thousands and ravaged swaths of the capital. No one has yet been held to account for the crime, while Judge Fadi Sawwan’s investigation has stalled over procedural motions and politically motivated accusations of bias. The highest-ranking figure to be charged, caretaker Premier Hassan Diab, has refused questioning. Families of victims have regularly protested for redress, with justice from the widely criticized judiciary appearing far away.