BEIRUT (Reuters) – Lebanon’s Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah on Tuesday dismissed accusations of any links between the group and the killing of researcher and activist Lokman Slim. “Any incident that happens in your area then you are accused until the opposite is proven? Is this something that is practiced in the whole wide world? Where else is this logic present?” Nasrallah said in a televised speech. Activist Lokman Slim was shot and found dead in his car in south Lebanon earlier in February, marking the first killing of a high-profile activist in years. He was a critic of the Iran-backed Hezbollah group. His sister has suggested he was murdered because of those views. Hezbollah has previously condemned the killing.

A filmmaker and publisher, Slim had spoken out against what he called Hezbollah’s intimidation tactics and attempts to monopolise Lebanese politics. Nasrallah was also critical on Tuesday about blame pointed at the group for involvement in the Aug. 4 Beirut blast that killed 200 people. “Hezbollah is guilty until proven otherwise – what kind of a rule is that? …Beirut port – you, Hezbollah, blew up Beirut port until the truth about the explosion is revealed,” he said. The judicial investigation into the blast is still under way in Lebanon with judge Fadi Sawan having charged caretaker Prime Minister Hassan Diab, whose cabinet quit after the blast, and three former ministers with negligence. Sawan is due to interrogate one of the three former ministers, Youssef Finianos, a Hezbollah ally sanctioned by the United States for his links to the group that Washington considers a terrorist organisation.

by thearabweekly.com — BEIRUT – Paralysed by financial crisis and riven with political risk, a number of Lebanon’s banks are struggling to meet a Central Bank target to raise their capital defences by 20% by the end of this month. Less than half of the country’s dozen or so large banks are expected to meet the requirement, which the central bank set in August to reinforce the sector, according to four banking sources with direct knowledge of the situation. Those that are on track to meet central bank targets have largely tapped existing shareholders or depositors, converting local dollar deposits into equity instruments or sold overseas businesses. The situation underscores the scale of the problem facing Lebanon’s banks, heavily exposed to one of the world’s most indebted states and starved of funding. Their customers have largely been frozen out of their dollar deposits and blocked from transferring cash abroad since late 2019.

Given the wall of losses facing the sector, some investors and economists say it’s too little too late anyway. The 20% target laid down by Riad Salameh, Lebanon’s veteran Central Bank governor, is equivalent to around $4 billion, he confirmed to Reuters. That is far short of the $83 billion hole in banks’ balance sheets estimated by the outgoing government last year as part of a financial rescue plan it had drawn up. — ‘All insolvent’ — “They are all insolvent,” said Mike Azar, a debt finance advisor and a former lecturer in international economics at John Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. “There’s no prospect for recovery as things stand, until there is a sector-wide bank resolution and restructuring and finally a fresh capital raise.”

By NAJIA HOUSSARI – arabnews.com — BEIRUT: Lebanese President Michel Aoun has blasted Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri for a speech containing “inaccuracies and incorrect information.” The two leaders have been at loggerheads for months, unable to agree on the formation of a government and each blaming the other for the lack of progress. Hariri returned as prime minister-designate last October, almost a year after he stepped down under street pressure. Lebanon’s government had quit after the Aug. 4 port blast in Beirut and remains in a caretaker capacity. Hariri on Sunday gave a televised speech marking the 16th anniversary of his father’s assassination. He said he was not responsible for the political stalemate that was undermining the country’s ability to deal with the many troubles it was facing, including the coronavirus pandemic, an economy in crisis and the aftermath of the port explosion. He also objected to allegations that he had infringed on the president’s prerogatives in forming the government or on Christians’ rights, but added that he “did not allow the president to choose the ministers he wanted, especially Christian ministers.”

A 1943 unwritten agreement, the Lebanese National Pact, between then-President Bechara El-Khoury and Prime Minister Riad Al-Solh founded independent Lebanon as a multi-confessional state. It was a power-sharing arrangement between Christians and Muslims, whereby the president was always required to be a Maronite Christian, the prime minister a Sunni Muslim, and the speaker of parliament a Shiite. Aoun hit back at Hariri in a statement. “Hariri exploited the anniversary of his father’s martyrdom and included in his speech many inaccuracies and incorrect information. Hariri is trying to impose new norms that are contrary to principles, the constitution, and the Lebanese National Pact,” the president said.

by arabnews.com — NAJIA HOUSSARI — BEIRUT: Lebanon’s Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri said on Sunday that although he had been subjected to “slander and lies,” he was “very patient” and determined to form a new government. In a televised speech marking 16 years since the assassination of his father, Rafik Hariri, he said that he would never accept giving “the blocking third in the government to the president of republic.” Hariri said that during his meeting with Michel Aoun on Friday “the president of the republic asked for a quota of six minsters and for granting the Armenian Tashnag party a minister out of this quota.” “Things are not going well, for the economy is in crisis, a dear part of our beloved Beirut was destroyed by the explosion of the port, the new coronavirus pandemic is devastating our families, and the series of assassinations is continuing with the last victim being martyr Lokman Slim,” Hariri said. “A specialists’ government of nonparties members is the only one capable of implementing the necessary reforms, whose road map was set by the initiative of French President Emmanuel Macron, otherwise no one will help us and the deterioration will continue until the big explosion.” He continued: “Fighting corruption starts with a reform that guarantees the independence of the judiciary, which stops pressures on some judges to open or close certain cases according to political affiliations.”

Hariri considered that “the one who is blocking the forming of the government is the one who is obstructing the launching of reforms, delaying preventing the collapse, and launching reconstruction.” On the anniversary of his father’s death, Hariri stressed that the ruling issued by the Special Tribunal for Lebanon against Slim Ayyash, convicted in absentia of killing Rafik Hariri in a 2005 bombing, should be executed and that he should be handed over no matter how long it took. Ayyash is still at large and Hezbollah refuses to hand him over as it does not recognize the tribunal. Hariri rejected criticism of his late father, saying: ‘Hariri’s policy had brought back Lebanon to the scene, attracted investors and tourists, and set the first cellular network in the Middle East even before Israel did, and it was a policy of moderation.’

by AFP — BEIRUT: Lebanon kicked off Covid-19 vaccinations Sunday with jabs for health care workers and the elderly in an inoculation drive it hopes will keep the outbreak in check amid a deepening economic crisis. The country has been under lockdown since mid-January, after an unprecedented spike in cases blamed on holiday gatherings forced overwhelmed hospitals to turn away patients. Medical workers and those aged over 75 were the first to receive Pfizer/BioNTech shots at three major Beirut hospitals, a day after a shipment of 28,500 doses arrived at the capital’s airport. The World Bank has allocated $34 million to inoculate an initial two million of Lebanon’s six million inhabitants. “Finally there’s a glimpse of hope that things will get back to normal,” said medical student Dana Chatila, who was waiting in her white lab coat and mask outside the American University Medical Center where she works in the emergency department. “It’s going to take time of course, but the darkness is ending.”

The pandemic has compounded the woes of Lebanese, who are struggling with a dire economic crisis and still reeling from Beirut’s massive port blast last summer that killed more than 200 people and destroyed swathes of the capital. More than half the population lives in poverty, and rights groups have warned millions will struggle to survive without help if coronavirus restrictions last too long. Caretaker prime minister Hassan Diab said: “We hope to reach adequate community protection so life can gradually return to normal in Lebanon as soon as possible.” The first jab was given to Mahmoud Hassoun, head of the intensive care unit at Rafik Hariri Hospital, which has been at the forefront of battling the outbreak. “Hopefully this will be the beginning of the end of this plague in the country,” he told AFP. The second to roll up his shirt sleeves in front of the cameras was popular Lebanese comedian Salah Tizani, 93, known by his stage name Abu Salim. “I’m telling everyone to come and get vaccinated,” he said. “Better to get vaccinated than to be knocked down by this deadly virus.”

by Bloomberg Dubai — Lebanon’s annual inflation rate reached a record high and food prices soared by up to 400% in December, highlighting the dramatic impact on consumers and businesses of the country’s worst financial crisis in decades. Annual inflation was 84.9% in 2020, compared to just 2.9% a year earlier, according to data released by the government’s Central Administration of Statistics on Thursday. It’s the highest since 2013, when the current readings began. Consumer prices jumped 145.8% in December versus the same month of 2019.

By NAJIA HOUSSARI — arabnews.com — BEIRUT: Lebanon has launched an urgent coronavirus vaccination rollout following the arrival of the first batch of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine at Beirut’s Rafic Hariri International Airport. The consignment of 28,500 vaccines arrived from Belgium and was transferred to the Ministry of Health for storage and distribution to approved medical centers and hospitals. Medical and nursing staff as well as paramedics working in coronavirus departments in the country’s hospitals will be among the first to be treated when the rollout begins on Sunday. About 150 people will be vaccinated in three hospitals in Beirut, with the number expected to increase to between 300 and 400 per day by next week in 17 centers across the country. At least 57 vaccination centers are expected to be operating within three weeks. Care homes for the elderly will also be included early in the vaccination program, Reda Al-Mousawi, media adviser at the Ministry of Health, said.

Lebanese hospitals have struggled in the past year amid the country’s acute financial crisis and some of the region’s highest coronavirus infection rates. The total number of virus cases in Lebanon reached 334,086 and 2,462 deaths. Dr. Abdul Rahman Bizri, an infectious disease specialist and head of the National Committee for the Administration of Corona Vaccine, told Arab News that the first people to receive the vaccine will be identified by the three hospitals, which will begin vaccinations on Sunday. “I have not been informed that the president, parliamentary speaker and the prime minister will be first to receive the vaccine,” he added. Bizri said that hospitals have rehearsed their vaccination procedures before opening their doors next week. “We have learned from the mistakes of the Americans and French, and are trying to avoid the same issues,” he said.

By NAJIA HOUSSARI — arabnews.com — BEIRUT: Lebanon’s Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri has again held talks with President Michel Aoun during his unexpected visit to Baabda Palace, which did not result in any progress to form a new government. Following the meeting, Hariri said that after his visits to Turkey, Egypt and France, he sensed enthusiasm for forming a government through the roadmap drawn up by French President Emmanuel Macron, which Lebanese political parties agreed to at the Pine Residence on Aug. 6, 2020, in order to save Lebanon, stop the deterioration and rebuild Beirut Port.

From Baabda Palace, he warned that “without a government of specialists non-affiliated with political parties, we cannot undertake the task of saving Lebanon.” He added: “If anyone thinks that if this government includes political members, the international community will open up to us or give us what we want, he would be wrong. The basic idea is to form a government that includes specialized ministers who do not irritate any political team and work only to complete the project presented to them.” He noted that he consulted with Aoun: “We made no progress, but I explained to him the importance of the golden opportunity that we have, so we must accelerate the formation of this government, and every political team must bear the responsibility of its stances from now on.” Hariri insists on forming “an 18-minister government made up of specialists,” and he reiterated his rejection of a blocking third: “This will not change for me.” The political discord between Hariri and Aoun had escalated after Aoun accused Hariri of being a “liar” in a leaked video of a meeting between the president and caretaker Prime Minister Hassan Diab on Jan. 11.

By Owen Kirby — thehill.com — The widely reported mob-style hit on activist and intellectual Lokman Slim on a back road in southern Lebanon last Wednesday night follows a well-known and sad pattern in Lebanese politics: When the Iranian-backed Party of God’s public standing takes a dip, someone pays, always. Someone must, of course, because the “Resistance” — the party that delivered “Divine Victory” over Israel in 2006 — can never be faulted for what has been wrought upon the much-beleaguered Lebanese people. Faulting Hezbollah was Slim’s daily sustenance. Former prime minister Saad Hariri noted in a tweet on Thursday that “Lokman Slim was perhaps clearer than everyone in pinpointing where the threat to the country is coming from… He did not compromise nor back down.” Hariri knows only too well the price of being uncompromising where Hezbollah or its patrons (read: Iran and, previously, Syria) are concerned; the life sentencing, in absentia, at the Hague in December of a Hezbollah operative for his own father’s murder is a ready reminder of the party’s reputation in this regard.

That Slim, himself a Shia, had long criticized Hezbollah’s monopoly over his own community’s social, political and economic life — and by extension Lebanon’s — and somehow lived to tell about it, until now, was a mystery to some. One theory was that by allowing a certain level of dissent within the Shia community that was never permitted to domestic foes without, Hezbollah could glean some internal democratic veneer. Besides, Hezbollah’s communal control and Lebanon’s confessional polarization has been such that the party did not worry as much about competition from within, especially from one armed with only a sharp tongue and independent mind. Not that Slim previously escaped the Party of God’s attention or ire, being regularly labeled in its print, broadcast and social media as a fifth columnist for both expressing his views and a willingness to engage with any and all in the foreign diplomatic and press corps to warn about the threats posed by Hezbollah to Lebanon’s and the region’s stability. The threats to his own person were real, as he knew, and he was not without options and opportunities to weather the periodic storms in some academic sinecure, somewhere safe; but Slim chose to remain in his own country, continuing to expose, publicly, what he knew to be true, regardless of the risks and regardless if anyone at home or abroad were listening.

BEIRUT (AP) — Lebanon’s former army chief told the lead investigator of last year’s massive Beirut port blast on Thursday that he had recommended, years before the explosion, that tons of seized ammonium nitrate stored there be sold privately or sent back to importers. The military had no use for the volatile chemical, testified Jean Kahwaji, who was army chief until 2017. Kahwaji was summoned for questioning as a witness six months after the probe began, the first army official and the most senior security official to testify in the probe. He told the lead investigator that the customs department had asked the army in late 2015 if it was interested in the stored fertilizer, which could also be used as an explosive. The army, after carrying out tests, said it had no use for the ammonium nitrate because it was a large amount and “has limited use and because it dissolves with time, it constitutes a danger if stored for a long time,” Kahwaji said.

Kahwaji said the army had no room to store it and no ability to get rid of it. He added the army then asked the customs authority to sell it to a private explosive company in Lebanon or to re-export to the country of origin at the expense of the importers. According to a local media investigation, the importers had carried out their own tests of the nearly 3,000 tons of ammonium nitrate, months after it was stored at the port, and then dropped any claims to the shipment. The chemicals ended up staying in the warehouse for six years before detonating. What sparked the explosion remains unknown. The volatile fertilizer ignited last Aug. 4, causing one of the largest non-nuclear explosion in history, disfiguring Beirut and killing 211 people. More than 6,000 were injured in the explosion.