Region | Lebanon
Anti-government protesters block roads in Beirut
Supporters of Lebanon's Hezbollah-led opposition blocked roads with burning tyres and paralysed the airport in the capital Beirut to enforce a strike against the Western-backed government.
- AP
- Published: 09:35 May 7, 2008
- Image Credit: AP
- Lebanese soldiers stand by burning tires during a protest in Beirut, Lebanon.
Beirut: Supporters of Lebanon's Hezbollah-led opposition blocked roads with burning tyres and paralysed the airport in the capital Beirut on Wednesday to enforce a strike against the Western-backed government.
Gunfire was heard in Tayouni, while clashes between pro-government and opposition groups took place at Corniche Mazraa.
A stun grenade was thrown into a crowd in a main thoroughfare in the Muslim sector of Beirut, lightly injuring three protesters and two soldiers, the state-run National News Agency reported. It was not immediately clear who threw the stun grenade.
In the same area, pro- and anti-government supporters exchanged insults but were kept apart after the army intervened, witnesses said.
The strike was called by labour unions to demand pay raises after they rejected a last-minute government offer as insufficient. But it turned into a showdown between the militant Shiite Hezbollah, which leads the opposition, and Western-backed Prime Minister Fuad Saniora.
Ghassan Ghoson, president of the General Federation of Labour Unions, said the strike has been postponed to another day due to security reasons.
Lebanon's 17-month-old political crisis took a turn for the worse this week when the government decided to confront the powerful Hezbollah. The Cabinet on Tuesday said it would remove Beirut airport's security chief over alleged ties to Hezbollah.
Lebanon's top prosecutor is investigating allegations by pro-government leader Walid Jumblatt that Hezbollah set up cameras near the airport in Hezbollah's stronghold of south Beirut to monitor the movement of anti-Syrian Lebanese politicians and foreign dignitaries. Jumblatt suggested the militant group was planning to bomb aircraft to assassinate senior leaders.
The government also declared that a telecommunications network used by Hezbollah for military purposes was illegal and a danger to state security.
Hezbollah and Shiite political and religious leaders rejected the government's decisions, raising tensions ahead of the planned labour strike.
The strike paralysed Beirut international airport. Airport employees joined for six hours while opposition protesters blocked the roads leading to the country's only air facility. The strike led to the cancellation or delay of 19 incoming and 13 outgoing flights. The roads have now been unblocked.
The strike was largely confined to Shiite Muslim areas of Beirut and its southern suburbs where support for Hezbollah is strong. It was largely ignored in Sunni Muslim and Christian areas of the city which support the government.
However, many schools were closed because the strike halted buses and authorities wanted to avoid putting students at risk on the roads with the possibility of unrest.
To enforce the strike, young opposition activists went out early in the morning and began piling up tires and setting them on fire on some major highways in opposition-controlled areas of the city and its southern suburbs.
Trucks brought in dirt and dumped it on the main highway to Beirut international airport and several nearby intersections to block access. In some areas, the protesters used old cars or garbage containers to block the streets and set them on fire.
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