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BEIRUT: Protesters set fire to banks, smashed windows and blocked roads in the Lebanese capital on Thursday as public anger over the country’s deteriorating economy deepened, with the local currency plunging to a new low against the dollar.
A decision by the Association of Banks in Lebanon to close all branches further angered citizens and depositors already facing restrictions on withdrawals. The move came as the Lebanese pound fell to a record low of 80,000 to the dollar.
Depositors and protesters targeted five banks in the Badaro neighborhood of Beirut — Bank Audi, Fransabank, Credit Bank, Byblos Bank, Bank of Beirut, and BBAC.
They then attempted to storm the house of the head of the Association of Banks, Salim Sfeir, after staging a sit-in in front of the building in Sin El Fil in the eastern suburbs of Beirut.
Protesters smashed the glass facades of banks and set car tires alight outside the armored doors that most premises had installed following the October, 2019 protests.
Banks earlier had told most employees to stay home, and said clients were not allowed to enter any branch.
Firefighters quickly put out the fires, while riot police took up positions outside some of the banks and the Lebanese army reopened nearby roads.
Protesters also blocked the Rafic Hariri International Airport Road in Beirut and the coastal highway leading to the Iqlim Al-Kharoub area.
Tires were also set ablaze on major roads in Sidon, Marjayoun and Tyre, which are affiliated with Hezbollah and the Amal movement.
Protests were also staged in the Badnayel-Qasrnaba area in the Bekaa Valley, loyal to Hezbollah and the Amal movement, and on the Tripoli-Beddawi highway in northern Lebanon.
Economist Violette Balaa described the protests as a “fabricated disturbance and the result of the political dispute.”
She added: “Those who burned the banks today are not all depositors. Depositors do not know how to burn tires or where to go. It is an attack on the Lebanese economy and confidence in it.
“What is happening has political objectives. Some people are benefiting from what is happening, particularly dollar speculators, although the state has arrested 40 illegal money changers.”
However, the Mutahidoun (United) Alliance said that “depositors are outraged and are insisting on recovering their deposits while rejecting any further delays.”
It added: “This move aims to send a final and decisive warning: It is necessary to stop the arbitrariness and intransigence of the bank owners and their association, which was charged with obstruction of justice the day before yesterday and labeled as ‘the association of villains.’ It is also important to implement the judicial verdicts given in favor of the depositors against the banks so they can recover their deposits.”
Amin Salam, caretaker economy minister, told a press conference on Thursday that a decision had been taken to “allow the pricing of goods in supermarkets in dollars while adopting the black market exchange rate because it is not possible to rely on the exchange rate of a certain platform.”
Meanwhile, army chief Gen. Joseph Aoun said that “without the army’s determination, our nation would have been in a much more difficult situation due to the successive events and crises. The army will remain the guarantor of Lebanon’s security.”
The Lebanese army said that three soldiers had been killed in armed clashes with wanted drug dealers during a raid in the town of Hor Taala in the Bekaa Valley.
Army command said that three wanted individuals were also killed when army units and an intelligence patrol forced their way into a property.
TUNIS: At least 34 African migrants were missing on Friday after their boat sank off Tunisia, the fifth shipwreck in two days, raising the total number of missing to 67 amid a sharp increase in boats heading toward Italy, Tunisian officials said.
The Italian coast guard said on Thursday it had rescued about 750 migrants in two separate operations off the southern Italian coastline, hours after at least five people died and 33 were missing in an attempted sea crossing from Tunisia.
Tunisian Judge Faouzi Masmoudi said that seven people had died in the boat capsizes off the coast of the city of Sfax, including babies and children.
Houssem Jebabli, an official at the National Guard, said the Coast Guard had stopped 56 boats heading for Italy in two days and detained more than 3,000 migrants, mostly from sub-Saharan African countries.
According to UN data, at least 12,000 migrants who have reached Italy this year set sail from Tunisia, compared with 1,300 in the same period of 2022. Previously, Libya was the main launch pad for migrants from the region.
The coastline of Sfax has become a major departure point for people fleeing poverty and conflict in Africa and the Middle East for a shot at a better life in Europe.
Tunisia is struggling with its worst financial crisis due to stalled negotiations with the International Monetary Fund for a loan amid fears of a default in debt repayment, raising concerns in Europe, especially in neighboring Italy.
Tunisia has been gripped by political upheavals since July 2021, when President Kais Saied seized most powers, shutting down parliament and moving to rule by decree.
Europe risks seeing a huge wave of migrants arriving on its shores from North Africa if financial stability in Tunisia is not safeguarded, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said on Friday. Meloni called on the IMF and some countries to help Tunisia quickly to avoid its collapse. “If we do not adequately address those problems we risk unleashing an unprecedented wave of migration,” he said.
LATAKIA, Syria: Latakia’s governor has lauded the UAE’s efforts to rescue those affected by the earthquake that hit several cities in Syria last month, the Emirates News Agency reported on Friday.
“The UAE has supported the Syrian people since the quake first struck the country,” Amer Ismail Hilal was quoted as saying. He added that the support included search and rescue teams, as well as humanitarian aid.
Hilal highlighted the deep-rooted relations between the two countries, underscored by Syrian President Bashar Assad’s visit to the UAE last Sunday.
On behalf of Latakia governorate, Hilal thanked the UAE’s government and people for the continuous efforts of the Emirates Red Crescent field teams.
BEIRUT: Weeks after a violent crackdown on migrants in Tunisia that triggered a perilous rush to leave by smuggler boats for Italy, many African nationals are still homeless and jobless and some say they still face racist attacks.
Outside the UN refugee agency in Tunis, dozens of African migrants stood protesting this week by the temporary camp where they have lived, including with children, since authorities urged landlords to force them from their homes.
“We need evacuation. Tunisia is not safe. No one has a future here when you have this color. It is a crime to have this color,” said Josephus Thomas, pointing to the skin on his forearm.
In announcing the crackdown on Feb. 21, President Kais Saied said illegal immigration was a criminal conspiracy to change Tunisia’s demography, language the African Union described as “racialized hate speech.”
US Assistant Secretary of State Barbara Leaf said Saied’s comments had unleashed “attacks and a tidal wave of racist rhetoric,” with rights groups saying hundreds of migrants reported being attacked or insulted.
Saied and Tunisia’s foreign minister have rejected accusations that he or the government are racist and they announced steps to ease visa regulations for Africans and reminded police of anti-racism laws.
While the official crackdown appeared to end weeks ago, migrants say they still face abuse.
“People told me ‘since you are in our country after the president’s speech, don’t you have any dignity?’ I kept silent and they told me I am dirt,” said Awadhya Hasan Amine, a Sudanese refugee outside the UNHCR headquarters in Tunis.
Amine has lived in Tunis for five years after fleeing Sudan and then Libya with her husband. Now 30, she has been living on the street outside the UNHCR headquarters since local people pelted her house in the capital’s Rouad district with rocks.
“We want to live in a place of safety, stability and peace. We don’t want problems in Tunisia,” she said.
Although some West African countries evacuated hundreds of their citizens earlier this month, many remain stuck in Tunisia, unable to support themselves let alone afford passage home or pay smugglers hundreds of dollars to ferry them to Europe.
“Tunisia is an African country. Why do they do racist things to us?” said Moumin Sou, from Mali, who was sacked from his job working behind a bar after the president’s speech and was beaten up the next day by a man in the street who stole his money.
Sou wants to return home, he said, but many others are determined to travel on to Europe.
In the wake of the crackdown, in which police detained hundreds of undocumented migrants and authorities urged employers to lay them off and landlords to evict them, smuggler crossings to Italy have surged.
Tunisian National Guard official Houssem Jbeli said on Wednesday alone the coast guard had stopped 30 boats carrying more than 2,000 people. On the same day and the following day four boats sank, with five people drowned, authorities said.
JEDDAH: More than 540,000 children under the age of 5 in Yemen are suffering life-threatening severe acute malnutrition and a child dies every 10 minutes from preventable causes, the UN said on Friday.
The UN children’s agency UNICEF warned that it could be forced to slash support for children in Yemen without a funding boost.
A total of 11 million children are in need of humanitarian assistance, UNICEF says.
It said it required $484 million to continue assistance this year, but the UN raised only $1.2 billion for all its agencies in Yemen at a pledging conference in Switzerland last month, well short of the $4.3 billion target.
“The funding gap UNICEF continued to face through 2022 and since the beginning of 2023 is putting the required humanitarian response for children in Yemen at risk,” the organization said said.
“If funding is not received, UNICEF might be forced to scale down its vital assistance for vulnerable children.”
The conflict in Yemen began in 2014 when the Iran-backed Houthi militia seized the capital, Sanaa, in a coup. An Arab coalition intervened the following year to support the legitimate government, and launched their first assaults against Houthi positions on March 26, 2015.
A truce expired last year, but fighting has remained largely on hold.
More than 11,000 children are known to have been killed or maimed since the conflict escalated in 2015.
Fighting in Yemen has triggered what the UN describes as one of the world’s worst humanitarian tragedies. Itsays more than 21.7 million people, two-thirds of Yemen’s population, will need humanitarian assistance this year.
SANAA: Rare protests have erupted against Yemen’s Houthi rebels following the funeral of a popular critic found dead after he was detained by the group.
Videos posted on social media showed hundreds of angry demonstrators carrying the body of Hamdi Abdul Razaq through the streets of Ibb province on Thursday.
Eyewitnesses, who asked to remain anonymous out of fear of reprisal, said the Thursday protests spanned several neighborhoods and protesters were heard chanting “No Houthis after today.”
Activists have accused the rebel authorities of abducting, torturing and killing Hamdi Abdul Razaq, who spoke out against the Houthi authorities in videos posted on Youtube. Followers knew him by his profile name, “Al-Mukohl.” He was reported dead by authorities late last week. His family have not commented on the incident.
In a series of videos, Abdul Razaq openly criticized Houthi rule, branding its administration as corrupt and repressive.
Houthi forces, who control Sanaa and most of northern Yemen, have cracked down on dissent in their territories. Some who oppose them have been charged for working with Saudi Arabia, which is part of the coalition battling the Houthis.
Yemen’s devastating conflict began in 2014, when the Houthis seized the capital of Sanaa and much of northern Yemen and forced the government into exile. The coalition intervened in 2015 to try to restore the internationally recognized government to power.
In a statement following Thursday’s protest, the Houthi authorities claimed Abdul Razaq had been detained for insulting another influential family in the area. On Sunday, he escaped through a bathroom window of the police station and was found in a half-constructed building later that day, it said.
In a statement Thursday, the head of Yemen’s internationally recognized government, Rashed Al-Alimi, offered his support to the protesters and said a monthly stipend would be given to Abdul Razaq’s family.
Mohammed Ali, a high-ranking Houthi official, later said on Twitter that a committee had been set up to further investigate the incident.
His death comes amid a string of similar reported incidents. Earlier this year, a fruit and vegetable vendor from northern Houthi-held territories was abducted and killed, whipping up widespread anger across the divided country.
On Tuesday four activists were handed prison terms, ranging from six months to three years, by a Houthi court for their criticism of the Iran-backed rebels on social media, a lawyer said.