by middleeasteye.net — Cheering erupted from balconies and windows in Lebanon on Sunday evening, as the country’s citizens celebrated their “heroic” medical workers battling the coronavirus pandemic. The initiative spread online with the Arabic hashtag “a cheer for the heroes”, shared by public figures including journalists, actors and the Arab pop star Ragheb Alama. In one Beirut neighbourhood, a woman draped in a Lebanese flag sang the national anthem as her neighbours drummed on pots and pans, an AFP journalist said. Elsewhere, Lebanese played drums and blew vuvuzelas, sharing videos of the street performances online. Similar initiatives have gained attention from Italy to France but they have remained rare in the Arab world.
Lebanon has reported 438 Covid-19 cases to date, with 10 deaths. To try to contain the spread of the virus, Lebanon has imposed isolation measures on its population until 12 April, with a nighttime curfew in effect. Schools, universities, restaurants and bars are closed. Lebanese security forces on Saturday cleared away a Beirut protest camp that served as the focal point for demonstrations against the governing elite that began in October, MEE reported. Many fear the country’s health-care system may be overwhelmed by cases. Measures to contain the virus present a further blow to the country’s already moribund economy. The government declared this month it could not pay foreign currency debts and the local currency has lost about 40 percent of its value since October.
Banks ease transfer of funds to students
BEIRUT: Lebanese banks said Sunday that they were ready to release funds of depositors to buy plane tickets for the Lebanese eager to return to Lebanon as many expatriates have expressed a desire to leave their host countries amid the spread of coronavirus. A statement by the Association of Banks in Lebanon said it was committed to transfering appropriate funds to the students studying abroad from the bank accounts of their parents. The initiative appears to have been in response to the mounting outcry from many depositors over the reluctance of banks to release sufficient funds to finance both medical treatment and student tuitions for Lebanese living abroad.
A source at ABL told The Daily Star that the banks were ready to ease the capital control restrictions so that depositors could buy airline tickets for their families living in Africa or Europe. “Of course the depositors must show evidence that the money they want to send to their families is intended to buy plane tickets or to finance the education of students abroad,” the source said. Some of the students who have decided to remain abroad due to the virus said they needed the money weather this phase. “ABL remains committed to transferring the suitable amount for the Lebanese students living abroad, if these students and their parents have an account in a Lebanese bank,” the statement said. The statement added that if the Lebanese state decided to bring back Lebanese students living abroad, the banks were “ready to transfer ticket fees to Middle East Airlines in U.S. dollars for every student … who has an account in Lebanese banks.”
