Salameh’s accounts frozen, warehouse fire finally extinguished, Kahaleh and Ain Ibl investigations: Everything you need to know to start your Wednesday

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Lebanon’s financial intelligence unit on Monday announced that former Banque du Liban governor Riad Salameh’s bank accounts had been frozen amid ongoing investigations, Reuters reported. The Special Investigation Commission said that similar measures targeted Salameh’s brother Raja, his son Nady, his former assistant Marianne Hoayek and his former romantic partner Anna Kosakova. Last week, the US, Canada and Britain jointly sanctioned Salameh and his associates for alleged corruption. A report by Alvarez and Marsal on their forensic audit of the BDL, seen by Reuters last week, claimed to have uncovered evidence on the “commission scheme” for which Salameh and his associates are being investigated. Salameh is accused of diverting hundreds of millions of dollars in commissions from the sale of central bank assets through a company owned by his brother, Raja. He regularly denies all allegations and last week told Reuters that the commission payments cited by A&M were a cost saving measure for the BDL.

The Civil Defense on Monday extinguished a fire in a textile warehouse in Beirut’s southern suburbs that broke out two weeks earlier and caused the death of one firefighter and injured several others. Additional entry points to the warehouse “eased the pressure” on firefighters after two weeks of continuous attempts to extinguish the blaze with only a single entrance to the site, Civil Defense spokesperson Charbel Msann told L’Orient Today. Efforts to extinguish the fire were hindered by products stored inside the warehouse “without any measures that take into account general safety rules,” the Civil Defense said last week. It remains unclear whether people displaced by the fire, which erupted in a warehouse occupying the lower floors of a residential building, could return to their homes. “Stocking products inside the warehouse near homes is very dangerous and should have been done under the supervision of the local authorities,” the Civil Defense also said.

Caretaker Interior Minister Bassam Mawlawi said on Monday investigations are ongoing into last Wednesday’s clashes in Kahaleh, where a Hezbollah truck overturned, and the death of a former Lebanese Forces official in Ain Ibl earlier this month. Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah the same day referenced the investigation into the incident in Kahaleh, which he claimed will reveal “who attacked whom.” The Hezbollah leader’s speech commemorated the 17th anniversary of the end of the July 2006 war with Israel. Nasrallah claimed the armed clashes that killed Kahaleh resident Fadi Bejjani and Hezbollah member Ahmad Ali Kassas were instigated by “one known TV channel,” which “raised tensions” after a crowd gathered around the overturned munitions-laden truck. Also on Monday, Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea said that while the party is “waiting for the security services' investigations” into the death of Elias Hasrouni in Ain Ibl, they have “suspicions” about Hezbollah’s involvement based on “the available information.” Last week, new surveillance footage purportedly showing Hasrouni’s kidnapping spurred an investigation into his death, which was originally thought to have resulted from a car accident.

Koura MP Adib Abdel Massih yesterday announced the withdrawal of his signature from a draft bill to repeal Article 534 of the Lebanese Penal Code, which criminalizes supposed “relations against nature.” Abdel Massih said his support for the draft bill was intended to “clarify the wording” of Article 534, which in practice has been used to prosecute homosexuality. The MP explained his withdrawal, saying he refuses “to allow anything that might be considered offensive to [his] church to be undermined.” Abdel Massih was one of nine MPs to back the bill when it was introduced to Parliament on July 12. In recent months, political and religious figures have increasingly employed anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric. Over the weekend, caretaker Culture Minister Mohammad Mortada and Forces of Change MP Mark Daou engaged in heated debate over the draft bill. Mortada said he hoped that the draft bill’s backers would “withdraw their signatures.” Daou referenced Lebanon’s constitution, which calls for “respecting general freedoms,” eventually retorting that “when officials reach such low levels, watching ‘Barbie’ becomes better than wasting time on them.” Mortada had called for “Barbie” to be banned for allegedly encouraging “perversity and gender transformation while calling for the rejection of patriarchy and ridiculing the role of mothers.”

In case you missed it, here’s our must-read story from yesterday: “Lebanon’s LGBTQ+ community targeted from every direction”

Compiled by Abbas Mahfouz