Speaking in regard to the investigation into Beirut’s horrific port explosion, the Lebanon’s Catholic President Michel Aoun made it clear that there “is a possibility of external interference through a rocket or bomb or other act.”
Whilst most of the citizens of Beirut have answered the governments call for everyone to put aside political and religious differences and work side by side to overcome the mass destruction and resulting deleterious social effects, groups of provocateurs and saboteurs have taken advantage of the chaos and have engineered rioting in the streets and even the takeover of some government buildings.
AsiaNews, the press agency of The Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions reports that “dark hands working in the shadows managed to fill the Place des Canons (Martyrs’ Square) not with peaceful and cheerful protesters, but with violent and destructive people.”
It goes on to confirm that the slogans and demands of the protesters “are clearly partisan political demands, not slogans for social justice and against corruption and hunger.”
But, most interestingly, the Pontifical press agency clarifies that:
“The rioters, gathered around former General Sami Rammah, seized the Foreign Ministry, setting it on fire. The building might have contained evidence useful to determine who was responsible for the explosions. The fire burnt large quantities of other sensitive documents as well.
The Economy and Environment Ministries were also occupied, but not set on fire; however, here too, documents were thrown in the air and onto the streets. Such documents could contain evidence of corruption going as far back as 1992, whose principals the government of Prime Minister Hassan Diab sought to punish.
Many people believe corrupt people are behind the riots, trying to get rid of the evidence of their guilt amid the ongoing chaos in order to ensure their impunity.”
