World

Lebanon – Clashes in over price hikes turn deadly

Members of the Lebanese army and security quell burning tyres which anti-government protesters have set on fire, blocking the coastal highway north in the Dbayeh area, north of the capital Beirut, early on April 27, 2020, in protest of the deteriorating economic situation. - Lebanon's worst economic crisis since the 1975-1990 civil war is now compounded by the coronavirus lockdown and nighttime curfew. Still, protesters have staged several daytime demonstrations recently, in continuation of a nationwide protest which erupted in October last year. (Photo by ANWAR AMRO / AFP)

Outrage over the clash of Lebanon’s national currency that sent food prices rising heated over into street disturbance overnight in the northern city of Tripoli, where a man injured in clashes between protesters and security forces died Tuesday.

The violence in Tripoli, Lebanon’s second-largest city with soaring unemployment and poverty, exploded late on Monday and continued well after midnight as furious demonstrators threw Molotov cocktails at numerous banks and prompted widespread damage.

Demonstrations also emitted elsewhere in Lebanon, leaving numbers wounded and more than a dozen people arrested, according to the Lebanese military.

The army announced a fire-bomb was thrown at one of its vehicles and a hand grenade was thrown at a patrol during rioting in Tripoli, mildly wounding two soldiers. Public and private property had been struck and banks set on fire, it said.

The army accused “troublemakers who had infiltrated the protesters to attack banks”, throwing firebombs and grenades at the military and setting a military vehicle on fire. It said 54 troops were injured across the country and that the army detained 13 people