This article is from the source 'bbc' and was first published or seen on . It will not be checked again for changes.
You can find the current article at its original source at http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-/1/hi/world/middle_east/7212235.stm
The article has changed 4 times. There is an RSS feed of changes available.
| Version 0 | Version 1 |
|---|---|
| Seven killed in Beirut violence | |
| (about 3 hours later) | |
| Seven people have been killed in the Lebanese capital, Beirut, after a demonstration against power cuts descended into violence. | |
| Shots were fired as the army intervened when protesters tried to block a road. | |
| An activist from the opposition Shia Amal movement was killed, triggering violent protests in which six more people were killed, reports say. | |
| Sporadic gunfire was heard as the fighting spread and Beirut's airport road was temporarily blocked by tyres. | Sporadic gunfire was heard as the fighting spread and Beirut's airport road was temporarily blocked by tyres. |
| A security official said gunmen had opened fire on troops as they tried to break up the demonstration. | A security official said gunmen had opened fire on troops as they tried to break up the demonstration. |
| He said the soldiers had then fired warning shots to disperse the protestors. | He said the soldiers had then fired warning shots to disperse the protestors. |
| But crowds of angry opposition supporters took to the streets around the capital, and in Shia parts of southern Lebanon, as news of the shooting spread. | |
| Burst of gunfire | |
| Amal released a statement saying the dead activist had not been involved in the protests, and it remains unclear who was responsible for his death. | |
| The demonstration had been against chronic electricity cuts in predominantly Shia areas of southern Beirut. | |
| Cars were torched as protests spread around Beirut | |
| Amal is part of an opposition alliance, led by the Shia militant group Hezbollah, that has been locked in a power struggle for more than a year with the Western-backed government of Prime Minister Fouad Siniora. | |
| Mr Siniora's supporters have accused Amal and Hezbollah of exploiting social and economic issues for political ends. Both parties have denied doing so. | |
| They urged their supporters to leave the streets as army reinforcements were deployed later on Sunday. | |
| But bursts of gunfire continued into the night around the scene of the first shooting in Mar Makhaeil. | |
| And in the nearby suburb of Ain Roummaneh, the site of a massacre that had triggered Lebanon's 1975-1990 civil war, a hand grenade wounded seven people and cars were set ablaze, security sources said. | |
| Acute instability | Acute instability |
| Sunday's violence was Beirut's worst since street clashes a year ago between gangs of pro-government and pro-opposition supporters. | |
| It followed a massive bomb blast on Friday which killed a senior Lebanese intelligence officer and three others in the east of the capital. | |
| The latest deaths come at a time of acute political instability in Lebanon as deadlock between pro-Syrian and pro-Western parties drags on. | The latest deaths come at a time of acute political instability in Lebanon as deadlock between pro-Syrian and pro-Western parties drags on. |
| Arab League foreign ministers are meeting in Cairo for the second time this month to try to break the deadlock which has left Lebanon without a president since November. | Arab League foreign ministers are meeting in Cairo for the second time this month to try to break the deadlock which has left Lebanon without a president since November. |