BEIRUT: Lebanese banks said on Monday they would ensure public sector workers were paid their salaries as they remain closed by a wave of protests against politicians blamed for corruption and steering Lebanon towards economic collapse.
Protesters set up new roadblocks early on Monday to keep pressure up, defying security forces who tried to re-open roadways but with orders not to use force.
As the day wore on the protests, now in their 12th day, appeared to be smaller than in recent days.
The crisis has paralysed Lebanon, closing banks, schools and some businesses. The government has yet to indicate it would cede ground to protesters, whose demands include its resignation.
On Monday President Michel Aoun said on he was "following developments", and Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri is due to hold a cabinet meeting to discuss one of the measures in an emergency reform package proposed last week.
Lebanon's banking association said banks would remain shut on Tuesday for a 10th working day, but said the central bank had provided the liquidity necessary to pay out salaries for public sector workers, including security forces.
Banks have previously said they will ensure people receive their end-of-month salaries through ATMs. The banks have said they are staying closed out of concern for the safety of customers and employees.
Bankers and analysts have also cited wide fears depositors will try to take out their savings when banks reopen.
Gabriel Sterne, head of global macro research at Oxford Economics, said Lebanon is facing a "bank jog", rather than a full-blown bank run. He added that capital controls were needed in the short-term, but can also scare away investors.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) said it was evaluating an emergency reform package the Lebanese government announced last week, but which has failed to defuse the popular anger or reassure foreign donors.
Capital inflows needed to finance the state deficit and pay for imports have been slowing down, generating financial pressures not seen in decades, including the emergence of a parallel market for dollars.
While Lebanon's pound currency is officially pegged at 1507.5 to the dollar, parallel market rates have risen in recent months.
One market source quoted a price of 1,700 pounds to the dollar, while a second quoted 1,740, a roughly 15% premium on the official rate.
As economic strains have grown in recent years, Lebanon's central bank and banks have taken measures to encourage people to keep money in local currency, in longer term deposits and inside the country.
While Lebanon has not imposed hard capital controls, a state prosecutor banned traders and money exchangers from taking significant amounts of physical dollar currency out the country at air and land borders, without specifying amounts.
Protesters gathered early on Monday to cut major arteries across Lebanon, using cars, tents and dumpsters.
"We know we are facing lying, corrupt ruling authorities. It's been 30 years of promises and promises. Why would I believe them now?" said Rawad Taha, 21, a university student manning a roadblock in Beirut.
"I won't leave the street until the government resigns or there's a tangible change I can feel."
On one major road in Beirut, protesters set up a make-shift living room with sofas, armchairs and a fridge for the sit-in.
The leaderless rallies have drawn people from around Lebanon furious at sectarian political leaders they see as plundering state resources for personal gain.
Lebanon is saddled with one of the world's highest levels of government debt as a share of economic output. The IMF has forecast a fiscal deficit of 9.8% of GDP this year and 11.5% next year.
Prime Minister Hariri's coalition government, which includes nearly all of Lebanon's main parties, tried to appease the protesters with a set of reforms including anti-corruption laws and long-delayed measures aimed at fixing state finances.
The plans includes accelerating long-delayed steps to fix the state-run power sector, which drains $2 billion from the treasury per year while failing to meet power needs for the Lebanese.
"We need to see not only what is in the package but also the timeline of the package for a country like Lebanon that has such high level of debt over GDP and high levels of twin deficits," Jihad Azour, director of the IMF's Middle East and Central Asia Department told Reuters.
"Fundamental reforms are urgently needed in Lebanon in order to restore macro-economic stability, bring confidence back, stimulate growth and provide some solutions to the issues that were raised by the street," Azour said.
Lebanon's closed banks pledge to pay out salaries
Lebanon's closed banks pledge to pay out salaries
- Protesters block roads with barricades, tents, cars for 12th day
- Banks remained closed for ninth day
Syria authorities say torched 1 million captagon pills
DAMASCUS: Syria’s new authorities torched a large stockpile of drugs on Wednesday, two security officials told AFP, including one million pills of captagon, whose industrial-scale production flourished under ousted president Bashar Assad.
Captagon is a banned amphetamine-like stimulant that became Syria’s largest export during the country’s more than 13-year civil war, effectively turning it into a narco state under Assad.
“We found a large quantity of captagon, around one million pills,” said a balaclava-wearing member of the security forces, who asked to be identified only by his first name, Osama, and whose khaki uniform bore a “public security” patch.
An AFP journalist saw forces pour fuel over and set fire to a cache of cannabis, the painkiller tramadol, and around 50 bags of pink and yellow captagon pills in a security compound formerly belonging to Assad’s forces in the capital’s Kafr Sousa district.
Captagon has flooded the black market across the region in recent years, with oil-rich Saudi Arabia a major destination.
“The security forces of the new government discovered a drug warehouse as they were inspecting the security quarter,” said another member of the security forces, who identified himself as Hamza.
Authorities destroyed the stocks of alcohol, cannabis, captagon and hashish in order to “protect Syrian society” and “cut off smuggling routes used by Assad family businesses,” he added.
Syria’s new Islamist rulers have yet to spell out their policy on alcohol, which has long been widely available in the country.
Since an Islamist-led rebel alliance toppled Assad on December 8 after a lightning offensive, Syria’s new authorities have said massive quantities of captagon have been found in former government sites around the country, including security branches.
AFP journalists in Syria have seen fighters from Islamist group Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS) set fire to what they said were stashes of captagon found at facilities once operated by Assad’s forces.
Security force member Hamza confirmed Wednesday that “this is not the first initiative of its kind — the security services, in a number of locations, have found other warehouses... and drug manufacturing sites and destroyed them in the appropriate manner.”
Maher Assad, a military commander and the brother of Bashar Assad, is widely accused of being the power behind the lucrative captagon trade.
Experts believe Syria’s former leader used the threat of drug-fueled unrest to put pressure on Arab governments.
A Saudi delegation met Syria’s new leader Ahmed Al-Sharaa in Damascus on Sunday, a source close to the government told AFP, to discuss the “Syria situation and captagon.”
Jordan in recent years has also cracked down on the smuggling of weapons and drugs including captagon along its 375-kilometer (230-mile) border with Syria.
Jordan says 18,000 Syrians returned home since Assad’s fall
AMMAN: About 18,000 Syrians have crossed into their country from Jordan since the government of Bashar Assad was toppled earlier this month, Jordanian authorities said on Thursday.
Interior Minister Mazen Al-Faraya told state TV channel Al-Mamlaka that “around 18,000 Syrians have returned to their country between the fall of the regime of Bashar Assad on December 8, 2024 until Thursday.”
He said the returnees included 2,300 refugees registered with the United Nations.
Amman says it has hosted about 1.3 million Syrians who fled their country since civil war broke out in 2011, with 650,000 formally registered with the United Nations.
Lebanon hopes for neighborly relations in first message to new Syria government
- Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah played a major part propping up Syria’s ousted President Bashar Assad through years of war
- Syria’s new Islamist de-facto leader Ahmed Al-Sharaa is seeking to establish relations with Arab and Western leaders
DUBAI: Lebanon said on Thursday it was looking forward to having the best neighborly relations with Syria, in its first official message to the new administration in Damascus.
Lebanese Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib passed the message to his Syrian counterpart, Asaad Hassan Al-Shibani, in a phone call, the Lebanese Foreign Ministry said on X.
Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah played a major part propping up Syria’s ousted President Bashar Assad through years of war, before bringing its fighters back to Lebanon over the last year to fight in a bruising war with Israel – a redeployment which weakened Syrian government lines.
Under Assad, Hezbollah used Syria to bring in weapons and other military equipment from Iran, through Iraq and Syria and into Lebanon. But on Dec. 6, anti-Assad fighters seized the border with Iraq and cut off that route, and two days later, Islamist militants captured the capital Damascus.
Syria’s new Islamist de-facto leader Ahmed Al-Sharaa is seeking to establish relations with Arab and Western leaders after toppling Assad.
Iraqi intelligence chief discusses border security with new Syrian administration
BAGHDAD: An Iraqi delegation met with Syria’s new rulers in Damascus on Thursday, an Iraqi government spokesman said, the latest diplomatic outreach more than two weeks after the fall of Bashar Assad’s rule.
The delegation, led by Iraqi intelligence chief Hamid Al-Shatri, “met with the new Syrian administration,” government spokesman Bassem Al-Awadi told state media, adding that the parties discussed “the developments in the Syrian arena, and security and stability needs on the two countries’ shared border.”
