Lebanese army units on Friday morning dispersed protesters and set up guard in Riad El-Solh, one of Beirut's central streets which leads up to the government building, a Sputnik correspondent from the scene reported
BEIRUT (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 12th June, 2020) Lebanese army units on Friday morning dispersed protesters and set up guard in Riad El-Solh, one of Beirut's central streets which leads up to the government building, a Sputnik correspondent from the scene reported.
The move came after a night of unrest which saw anti-government demonstrators barricade the street, while elsewhere, burning tires cut off major highways and spontaneous protests erupted outside politicians' houses. Parts of a building belonging to the Lebanese Central Bank in the northern city of Tripoli were set ablaze.
The renewed unrest comes on the back of a precipitous decline of the Lebanese pound against the dollar, trading at 5,000 or 6,000 at unofficial markets, as opposed to the officially pegged 1,500 per US dollar.
Prime Minister Hassan Diab called for an emergency cabinet meeting on Friday to discuss the deteriorating economic situation.
Demonstrations began in October 2019 after the government proposed a slew of new taxes to abate the economic decline. Though initially opposing the taxes, which included a proposal to tax the use of WhatsApp calls, they grew into a wide-scale movement against endemic corruption and mismanagement.
