NGO Says France's Military Equipment Used By Lebanese Police To Violently Quell Riots

Law enforcement equipment supplied by France to Lebanon might have been unlawfully used by the Lebanese security forces to crack down on peaceful rallies, an NGO revealed on Thursday

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 28th January, 2021) Law enforcement equipment supplied by France to Lebanon might have been unlawfully used by the Lebanese security forces to crack down on peaceful rallies, an NGO revealed on Thursday.

According to Amnesty International research, Lebanese police used French-developed weapons, including tear gas, rubber bullets, and armored vehicles against demonstrators in peaceful rallies, which were ongoing across Lebanon since October 2019 and through 2020 against the government mismanagement. As a result, at least 1,000 people were wounded by security troops, often using French-manufactured equipment, the group stated.

"Lebanese security forces are operating in a climate of impunity. There has been no effective investigation of the unlawful use of weapons, including those made in France, against peaceful protesters, and not a single security officer has been held to account by judicial authorities," Aymeric Elluin, the group's advocacy officer on arms transfers, said, as cited by its statement.

The rights group urged Paris to halt arms exports to Lebanon until its military proved they abandoned the "excessive use of force" against people.

The association noted that its conclusions were based on 101 analyzed videos of riots in the Lebanese capital of Beirut from 2019-2020 and also from summer 2015. Back then the nation protested against the authorities' poor response to a waste crisis, caused by the closure of the Beirut and Mount Lebanon region waste dump in the city.

The 2019-2020 rallies in Lebanon were sparked by the political crisis, with the resignation of the former government failing to improve the poor economic situation in the country, which was aggravated by the coronavirus pandemic and the devastating explosion on Beirut's port in August 2020.