BEIRUT - The Lebanese army was on high alert in the capital Beirut on Monday following weekend riots that left at least seven people dead and stoked fears of civil unrest.
Troops were out in force, setting up sandbags and checkpoints along many roads leading from the mainly Shiite neighbourhoods of southern Beirut to Christian areas of the capital. The scene was a stark reminder of the beginning of the 1975-1990 civil war as the first line of demarcation at the time was in the same area. “Black Sunday” said the headline in the Arabic daily Al Mustaqbal. Seven people were killed in Sunday’s riots and at least 40 were injured, including activists from the Syrian-backed opposition parties Amal and Hezbollah, a security official told AFP. Local newspapers and television reported that the violence broke out after youths protesting power cuts in the Shiite district of Shiyah entered the nearby Christian area of Ein el-Rommaneh and began throwing stones and setting cars on fire. A grenade was also thrown injuring seven people. The situation quickly escalated with youths moving in several neighbourhoods, setting tyres ablaze and briefly shutting down the main road leading to the airport. Protests alo broke out in the southern coastal cities of Sidon and Tyre and in the eastern Bekaa region. The bloodshed raised fears of civil unrest in a country already grappling with its worst political crisis since the end of the civil war and with a series of assassinations mainly targeting anti-Syrian figures.
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