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Added on the 04/08/2021 17:22:48 - Copyright : AFPTV - First images
Relatives of the victims of the Beirut port explosion demonstrate against MPs and the ruling class, accusing them of corruption outside the UNESCO palace in the Lebanese capital. The explosion at the port a year ago killed more than 200 people and was blamed on the negligence of the leadership.
Thousands of grief-stricken Lebanese marched Wednesday to mark a year since a cataclysmic explosion ravaged Beirut, protesting impunity over the country's worst peacetime disaster at a time when its economy was already in tatters. Shortly after 6:00 pm on August 4, 2020, a stock of ammonium nitrate fertiliser haphazardly stored at the city's port exploded and left swathes of the Lebanese capital looking like a war zone. What went down as one of the largest non-nuclear blasts in history killed at least 214 people, levelled entire neighbourhoods, irreparably scarred the nation's psyche and deepened the country's economic abyss. France 24's correspondent Sally Farhat tells us more.
Lebanese march towards Beirut port to mark a year since a cataclysmic explosion ravaged the city, protesting impunity over the country's worst peacetime disaster at a time when its economy was already in tatters.
Three years after Beirut’s massive port blast, attempts to prosecute those responsible are mired in political intrigue and many Lebanese have less faith than ever in their disintegrating state institutions.
Relatives of Beirut port blast victims march towards the blast site, to mark two years since the massive dockside explosion ripped through the Lebanese capital. IMAGES
A Shiite rally against port blast judge Tarek Bitar escalated into deadly clashes, turning parts of Beirut into a war zone and sparking memories of the 1975-1990 civil war. And so now the Lebanese people will have to choose, explains Joseph Bahout, IFI Director and Professor at American University of Beirut (AUB), 'between stability, peace, etc. which is something dear and valuable, and truth on the harbor explosion that have left, in fact, the city completely destroyed and people's minds completely destroyed.' Offering historical perspective, Professor Bahout adds, 'If you think of it historically and retrospectively, this is a choice that Lebanon is always confronting.' Both during the civil war, and following the assassination of Rafic Hariri, Lebanon 'had to confront this choice between truth and reconciliation, on the one hand, and stability on the other.' Despite assurances of Prime Minister Najib Mikati that the page will be turned, Professor Bahout warns that the prime minister is facing a 'Shakespearean dilemma.' And so, he fears that the government of Lebanon will ultimately follow the model of authoritarian regimes in the region by making 'the choice of preserving civil peace and squandering, and maybe dropping, the case of Judge Bitar and the entire inquiry on the port explosion.'
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