The Lebanese judge leading the investigation into last year’s massive explosion at Beirut’s port issued a subpoena for the country’s outgoing prime minister, Hassan Diab, after he didn’t show up for questioning on Thursday.
Judge Bitar set September 20 as a new date for questioning Diab, the state-run National News Agency reported.
Last month, Judge Tarek Bitar confirmed charges filed by his predecessor against outgoing Prime Minister Hassan Diab and three former ministers. Diab was summoned for questioning on accusations of intentional killings and negligence, along with former and current generals.
Hundreds of tons of ammonium nitrate, a highly explosive material used in fertilizers, had been improperly stored in the port for years, exploded on Aug. 4, 2020, killing 214 people, injuring more than 6,000 and devastating the capital.
The blast was one of the most powerful non-nuclear explosions ever recorded in history.
The prime minister had also declined to be interrogated last year by Bitar’s predecessor, Fadi Sawwan. Bitar was named to lead the investigation in February after Sawwan was removed following legal challenges by senior officials he had accused of negligence that led to the blast.
Diab, who resigned following the explosion, said in an interview last year, that he was being singled out and charged while others knew more.
On Wednesday, Bitar supervised, along with a group of lawyers and security officers a simulation of the welding that took place at the port shortly before last year’s explosion in order to determine whether the welding could have been the main cause of the fire that preceded the explosion.
In August 2020, at the time of the deadly Beirut port explosion, Lebanon was already drowning in an intense financial crisis caused by decades of state corruption and waste along with political chaos amid the disagreement of Lebanese different political parties.
This month, while Lebanese were grieving their loss during the explosion’s first anniversary, a fuel tank exploded in northern Lebanon, killing at least 28 people and injuring more than 70 civilians.
Today, the country is rife with poverty, instability, hopelessness while many Lebanese fled the country seeking a better life.
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