BEIRUT: Lebanese banks have unanimously decided to close their doors to clients indefinitely after a series of holdups by depositors seeking funds frozen in the banking system because of the country’s financial meltdown, two bankers told Reuters.
Banks will continue urgent operations for clients and back-office services for businesses, the bankers said, but front-office services will remain suspended after more than a dozen holdups in less than a month.
Banks closed for about a week last month in similar circumstances, but reopened at the beginning of October to allow employees to withdraw salaries.
Lebanon’s banks association has previously called on the government to enact formal capital controls to replace the informal controls banks adopted in 2019, but parliament has repeatedly failed to pass the law.
The government has made little progress toward reforms that would unlock an International Monetary Fund bailout to help ease a crisis caused by decades of wasteful spending and corruption.
Now in its third year, Lebanon’s financial meltdown has sunk the currency by more than 90 percent, spread poverty, paralyzed the financial system and frozen depositors out of their savings in Lebanon’s most destabilising crisis since the 1975-90 civil war.
Lebanese banks close again after holdups by depositors seeking their own money
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Lebanese banks close again after holdups by depositors seeking their own money
- Banks will continue urgent operations for clients and back-office services for businesses
Qatar joins US-led Pax Silica Alliance to secure semiconductor and critical mineral supply chains
- Doha says participation in alliance will enhance its international partnerships in fields of semiconductors, computing, cybersecurity and digital technologies.
- Qatar is the second Middle Eastern country to join the US-led economic-security coalition, after Israel
LONDON: Qatar joined the US-led Pax Silica Alliance on Monday in a move described as a strategic step to enhance cooperation in advanced technologies and supply-chain security.
The alliance was launched last month in Washington with the aim of securing global supply chains for semiconductors, artificial intelligence technology, critical minerals and digital infrastructure.
Doha said participation in the alliance will enhance its international partnerships in the fields of semiconductors, computing, cybersecurity and digital technologies, helping to boost the country’s technological capabilities and economic diversification efforts, the Qatar News Agency reported.
Ahmed Al-Sayed, Qatar’s minister of state for foreign trade affairs, and Jacob Helberg, the US under secretary of state for economic affairs, signed the Pax Silica declaration during a ceremony in Doha.
Al-Sayed said the world was undergoing a significant transformation driven by AI, rising energy and mineral demands, and rapid technological advancements.
He described the declaration as “a new milestone in the Qatar-US partnership, founded on trust, shared interests, and a unified vision for advancing stability and prosperity.”
He added: “Qatar recognizes that the currency of geopolitical power has changed. Sovereignty is no longer just about protecting borders, it is about securing the supply chains of the artificial intelligence era.”
Qatar is the second Middle Eastern country to join the alliance; Israel signed up in December. Japan, South Korea, Singapore, the UK and Australia have also joined the bloc.
“In a region often defined by its fractures, Pax Silica marks a historic opportunity for the region to shift from political rivalry to economic interoperability,” Helberg said.
