Beirut explosion: Lebanon’s entire Government resigns

ΣΧΟΛΙΟ ΙΣΤΟΛΟΓΙΟΥ : Οι έντιμοι πολιτικοί παραιτούνται...οι δικοί μας ξυρίζονται.! Σύσσωμη η Κυβέρνηση του Λιβάνου παραιτήθηκε. Είδατε κανέναν να παραιτηθεί μετά την τραγική καταστροφή στο Μάτι με τους πάνω από εκατό νεκρούς;; Μήπως παραιτήθηκε κανείς μετά την καταστροφή και τους θανάτους στην Εύβοια;; Αυτό δείχνει πόσο πορωμένοι και σάπιοι είναι, χωρίς ίχνος ανθρωπιάς και συνείδησης.

Lebanese Prime Minister Hassan Diab has announced his entire Government’s resignation amid outrage over the deadly Beirut port explosion that killed more than 150 people.

In a fiery speech, Mr Diab slammed Lebanon’s ruling elite for allowing “an apparatus of corruption bigger than the state”, and compared the explosion to an “earthquake that rocked the country”.
“We have fought valiantly and with dignity,” he said, referring to his cabinet.
“Between us and change is big powerful barrier.
“We have decided to stand with the people.”

The resignation comes after three cabinet ministers and seven members of parliament quit.
According to the country’s health ministry, at least 160 people were killed in Lebanon’s worst peacetime disaster, 6000 were wounded and about 20 remained missing.

Six days after the enormous chemical blast which wreaked destruction across swathes of the capital and was felt as far away as the island of Cyprus, residents and volunteers were still clearing the debris off the streets.
International rescue teams with sniffer dogs and specialised equipment remained at work at the disaster’s charred “ground zero”, where the search was now for bodies and not survivors.
The Lebanese want heads to roll over the tragedy and are asking how a massive stockpile of volatile ammonium nitrate, a compound used primarily as a fertiliser, was left unsecured at the port for years.
The country’s top officials have promised a swift and thorough investigation — but they have stopped short of agreeing to an independent probe led by foreign experts as demanded by the protesters.
RELATED: Photos reveal extent of blast destruction

The blast Tuesday, which was felt across the country and as far as the island of Cyprus, was recorded by the sensors of the American Institute of Geophysics (USGS) as having the power of a magnitude 3.3 earthquake. Picture: AFPSource:AFP

The colossal explosion of a huge pile of ammonium nitrate that had languished for years in a port warehouse left scores of people dead or injured. Picture: AFPSource:AFP

RESIGNATIONS
Four ministers had already decided they could no longer stand with a government that has shown little willingness to take the blame or to put state resources at the service of the victims.
The contagion looked set to spread, leaving Diab, who only accepted the top job in December last year, no option but to follow suit and agree to a full cabinet resignation.
At least nine politicians have also announced they would quit in protest, as have two senior members of the Beirut municipality.
The August 4 blast, which drew comparisons with the Hiroshima atom bomb, was so enormous that it altered the shape of not only Beirut’s skyline but even its Mediterranean coastline.
But it remained to be seen whether the disaster will also have a lasting impact on Lebanon’s entrenched post-war political culture, whose masters are widely seen as being primarily bent on self-preservation and buck-passing.
During a second evening of protests on Sunday, the rage sparked by the explosion that disfigured Beirut and scarred so many of its residents had not relented, and violent street clashes flared again.
“The resignation of ministers is not enough. Those who are responsible for the explosion should be held accountable,” said Michelle, a demonstrator in her early twenties.
She carried a poster of a friend who was killed in the blast, inscribed with the message, “My Government killed me.”

Karen, aged 25, stands in her destroyed apartment in Gemmayze neighbourhood, Beirut. Picture: Manu Ferneini/Getty ImagesSource:Getty Images

news.com.au1:06 Demonstrators lamented that security forces were using tear gas against blast victims instead of helping them clean their wrecked homes and find a roof. “We need an international investigation and trial to tell us who killed our friends and all the other victims, because they might try to conceal the truth,” said Michelle. French President Emmanuel Macron supported the idea when he visited last Thursday, but his calls for reform and transparency appeared to receive less attention among Lebanese officialdom than his offer to raise aid money. An online emergency support conference Macron chaired Sunday, attended virtually by a slew of world leaders including US President Donald Trump, came up with pledges for more than 250 million euros. Macron, who was given a hero’s welcome when he trudged through the rubble of ravaged old Beirut to meet distressed residents, stressed the aid would go “directly” to the population. Many Lebanese are sceptically waiting to see how the aid delivery will navigate a sophisticated and deeply entrenched system of local and sectarian patronage organised by the country’s party barons. Lebanese aid groups have warned foreign donors that any financial assistance risked being siphoned away. The Beirut disaster compounded what has become Lebanon’s annus horribilis, deepening a dire economic crisis which had dragged half of the country into poverty in recent months. The obliteration of the port and its huge grain silos in a country hugely reliant on imports has sparked fears of food shortages in the coming weeks. Adding to Lebanon’s woes, coronavirus cases are reaching new highs almost every day, putting further strain on hospitals that are treating blast victims and the dozens wounded in the repression of the protests. ΠΗΓΗ