BEIRUT: Lebanese judge Tarek Bitar resumed his investigation into the deadly 2020 Beirut port blast on Thursday, charging 10 people including security, customs and military personnel, a judicial official said.
The fresh charges come after a two-year hiatus in the investigation into the August 4, 2020 explosion that killed more than 220 people, injured thousands and devastated swathes of Lebanon’s capital.
Nobody has been held responsible for the blast, one of history’s biggest non-nuclear explosions.
The probe stalled two years ago after Lebanese militant group Hezbollah had accused Bitar of bias and demanded his dismissal, and officials named in the investigation had filed a flurry of lawsuits to hamper it from going forward.
The resumption comes with Hezbollah’s influence weakened after a war with Israel.
It also follows the election of a Lebanese president after the top position had been vacant for more than two years, with the new head of state Joseph Aoun last week pledging to work toward the “independence of the judiciary.”
The judicial official told AFP that “procedures in the case have resumed,” speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.
The official said that “a new charge sheet has been issued, charging three employees and seven high-ranking officers in the Lebanese army, in the General Security, in customs,” whose interrogations would begin next month.
In March and April, “investigating sessions” would resume with those previously charged in the case, including former ministers, lawmakers, security and military officers, judges and port management employees, after which Bitar would ask public prosecutors to issue indictments, according to the judicial official.
Lebanon’s new Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, until recently the presiding judge at the International Court of Justice in The Hague, on Tuesday promised “justice for the victims of the Beirut port blast.”
Analysts say Hezbollah’s weakening in a war with Israel last year allowed Lebanon’s deeply divided political class to elect Aoun last week and back him naming Salam as premier on Monday.
The Beirut blast probe has been repeatedly stalled since 2020.
In December 2020, lead investigator Fadi Sawan had charged former prime minister Hassan Diab — who had resigned in the explosion’s aftermath — and three ex-ministers with negligence.
But Sawan was later removed from the case after mounting political pressure, and the probe was suspended.
His successor, Tarek Bitar, also summoned Diab for questioning and asked parliament, without success, to lift the immunity of lawmakers who had served as ministers.
The interior ministry also refused to execute arrest warrants issued by Bitar, further undermining his quest for accountability.
The public prosecutor at the time, Ghassan Oueidat, thwarted his attempt to resume investigations in early 2023, after Bitar charged him in the case.
Hundreds of individuals and organizations, including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, have called for the United Nations to establish a fact-finding mission — a demand Lebanese officials have repeatedly rejected.
Beirut blast investigator resumes work after two years: judicial official
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Beirut blast investigator resumes work after two years: judicial official
- The fresh charges come after a two-year hiatus in the investigation into the August 4, 2020 explosion
- The resumption comes with Hezbollah’s influence weakened after a war with Israel
Syria’s Sharaa calls for united efforts to rebuild a year after Assad’s ouster
- Sharaa’s Islamist-led alliance launched a lightning offensive in late November last year, taking the capital Damascus on December 8
DAMASCUS: President Ahmed Al-Sharaa on Monday urged Syrians to work together to rebuild their country, still marred by insecurity and divisions, as they marked a year since the ousting of longtime ruler Bashar Assad.
The atmosphere in Damascus was jubilant as thousands of people took to the streets of the capital, AFP correspondents said, after mosques in the Old City began the day broadcasting celebratory prayers at dawn.
“What happened over the past year seems like a miracle,” said Iyad Burghol, 44, a doctor, citing developments including a warm welcome in Washington by President Donald Trump for Sharaa, a former jihadist who once had a US bounty on his head.
“People are demanding electricity, lower prices and higher salaries” after years of war and economic crisis, Burghol said.
“But the most important thing to me is civil peace, security and safety,” he added, taking a photo of people carrying a huge Syrian flag and sending it to his friends abroad.
Sharaa’s Islamist-led alliance launched a lightning offensive in late November last year, taking the capital Damascus on December 8 after nearly 14 years of war and putting an end to more than five decades of the Assad family’s iron-fisted rule.
Since then Sharaa has managed to restore Syria’s international standing and has won sanctions relief, but he faces major challenges in guaranteeing security, rebuilding crumbling institutions, regaining Syrians’ trust and keeping his fractured country united.
“The current phase requires the unification of efforts by all citizens to build a strong Syria, consolidate its stability, safeguard its sovereignty, and achieve a future befitting the sacrifices of its people,” Sharaa said following dawn prayers at Damascus’s famous Umayyad Mosque.
He was wearing military garb as he did when he entered the capital a year ago.
‘Heal deep divisions’
As part of the celebrations in Damascus, hundreds of military personnel marched down a major thoroughfare as helicopters flew overhead and people lined the streets to watch.
Sharaa and several ministers were in attendance, state media reported.
Monday’s events, including an expected speech by Sharaa, are the culmination of celebrations that began last month as Syrians began marking the start of last year’s lightning offensive.
Multi-confessional Syria’s fragile transition has been shaken this year by sectarian bloodshed in the country’s Alawite and Druze minority heartlands, alongside ongoing Israeli military operations.
In a statement, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said that “what lies ahead is far more than a political transition; it is the chance to rebuild shattered communities and heal deep divisions.”
“It is an opportunity to forge a nation where every Syrian — regardless of ethnicity, religion, gender or political affiliation — can live securely, equally, and with dignity,” he said in the statement, urging international support.
On Sunday, the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Syria, which investigates international human rights law violations since the start of the war, warned the country’s transition was fragile and said that “cycles of vengeance and reprisal must be brought to an end.”
The US-backed Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces that control swathes of northeast Syria said Monday that “the next phase requires launching a real, inclusive dialogue... and establishing a new social contract that guarantees rights, freedoms and equality.”
The Kurdish administration in the northeast has announced a ban on public gatherings on Monday, citing security concerns, while also banning gunfire and fireworks.
Under a March deal, the Kurdish administration was to integrate its institutions into the central government by year-end, but progress has stalled.
On Saturday, a prominent Alawite spiritual leader in Syria urged members of his religious minority, to which the Assad family also belongs, to boycott the celebrations, in protest against the “oppressive” new authorities.
