By Aya Iskandarani - .thenationalnews.com -- Lebanon’s military interrogated a prominent student activist on Monday after he took part in a university protest, a move rights defenders say is a worrying attempt to stifle dissent. Karim Safieddine, a student leader from the Mada Network, a political youth group that has gained momentum in the aftermath of the October protests, said he was summoned by military police for allegedly throwing rocks at security forces during a protest against tuition fee hikes at the American University of Beirut last December. He denies allegations of violence and said on Twitter that he “did not touch one stone”. “This is an attempt to intimidate us,” Mr Safieddine told The National after his interrogation. “Authorities are sending us a political message because our student grassroots movement is becoming more widespread.” Activists and human rights defenders said Mr Safieddine’s interrogation was part of a wider clampdown on individuals who were active in the mass anti-government protest movement of late 2019. An army representative declined to comment on the issue.

More than a million Lebanese took to the streets in October 2019 to demand the downfall of the ruling elite, widely accused of corruption and fomenting one of the worst financial crises in the country’s history. Inspired by this movement, the protests at AUB drew students from all sects, a rarity in a country where people’s politics fall along sectarian lines. They also inspired other universities to mobilise. About 50 supporters of Mr Safieddine gathered outside the military police station where he was interrogated. They held banners that read “state oppression does not scare us, the student movement lives on” and chanted “the military is stifling protesters”. Protester Farah El Baba, 25, said Mr Safieddine’s interrogation was meant to dissuade other young people from speaking out and mobilising. “They picked one of the most vocal activists in order to scare others,” she said.

By Timour Azhari BEIRUT (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – At least $250 million in U.N. humanitarian aid intended for refugees and poor communities in Lebanon has been lost to banks selling the local currency at highly unfavourable rates, a Thomson Reuters Foundation investigation has found. The losses – described in an internal United Nations document as “staggering” and confirmed by multiple sources – come as Lebanon grapples with its worst ever economic crisis, with more than half the population living under the poverty line, according to the World Bank. They stem from a plunge in the value of the Lebanese pound since the economy began to collapse in late 2019, sending prices soaring and forcing many Lebanese into poverty. The unfavourable exchange rates offered by Lebanese banks have hit Syrian and Palestinian refugees and poor Lebanese particularly hard as they are able to buy far less with the cash handouts they receive from the U.N.

Pre-crisis, refugees and poor Lebanese received a monthly payout of $27, equal to about 40,500 Lebanese pounds, from the World Food Programme (WFP). That has now risen to about 100,000 Lebanese pounds per person, but its real value is a fraction of what it was before – about $7 at the current rate. “The buying power used to be very good, we could get an acceptable food basket,” said Abu Ahmad Saybaa, a Syrian refugee who runs a Facebook page that highlights the challenges faced by refugees in Lebanon. “But now (the handouts) can’t get us more than a gallon of cooking oil. There’s a huge difference in purchasing power,” said the father of five, who has lived in a refugee camp in Lebanon’s rugged northeast since 2014. “It’s weighing on all of our health – mental and physical.”

by AFP — BEIRUT: The head of Lebanon’s powerful Shiite movement Hezbollah on Sunday congratulated ultraconservative cleric Ebrahim Raisi on winning Iran’s …

كتب سمير عطالله الاربعاء الماضي: https://www.annahar.com/arabic/authors/15062021092352216 يردد غاسلو الأيدي ان الأزمة عمرها ثلاثون عاماً. وقد يكون في ذلك شيء من الصحة. لكن …