Bustling Beirut comes to mid-week standstill

GENERAL STRIKE: A Lebanese protester feeds a fire during a demonstration for wage increases in Beirut. (AFP)

The usually bustling streets of Beirut were almost deserted but tense on Wednesday as tyre-burning protesters blocked roads for a general strike in which economic and political woes collided.

Soldiers, many dressed in riot gear, were deployed in force throughout the Lebanese capital where protesters burned tyres and overturned garbage bins in the streets barring traffic from passing through.

The road to the airport was blocked impeding travellers from making their flights.

Three army tanks and several army vehicles stood in between supporters of the rival camps along the Corniche Al-Mazraa thoroughfare, as groups of youths from the Western-backed ruling bloc and the Hezbollah-led opposition chanted political slogans and traded insults.

"This is not an economic protest. This is an attempt to overthrow the government," said Osman, 27, a supporter of the government.

"If they are trying to overthrow the government, then this is the start of the civil war. We need to protect our neighbourhood."

On the other side, opposition protestors painted a different picture of why they were taking to the streets.

"The prices are too high. We can't make a living and need to take a stand," said Ali, 21. "They [the majority] get more money than we do.

"A can of baby's milk used to cost 17,000 [Lebanese] pounds ($11) and now it costs 31,000 pounds."

His friend Hussein, 19, said: "The bottom line is we're waiting for the fight."

Older men sat on nearby sidewalks in front of closed businesses drinking Turkish coffee and smoking cigarettes and hookah pipes while watching the situation unfold.

In other parts of town, some struggled to make their way to work.

Lina Abu Ziki, a 35-year-old hairdresser, said she turned up at work "because I am not with the opposition... What they are doing is more detrimental to us than the economic situation."

Barbed wire and security forces in riot gear were placed in front of the Central Bank in Beirut where a protest march was to have taken place.

The demonstration, however, was called off by the General Confederation of Labour Union (CGTL) after it became clear that only few demonstrators were able to make their way to the meeting point in central Beirut.

Majdi Qobeissi, 26, a doorman at a local money exchange, said he decided to join the strike although his boss threatened to slash his daily wage in half if he didn't show up.

"What I make is not enough for me to make ends meet, so what if I want to start a family?" he said as he walked down the commercial Hamra street not far from the central bank.

Sanaa Hatem, a widowed mother of four, paced in front of her women's boutique on Hamra.

"I am against the strike and against Hezbollah's methods that have left the country without any tourism, but I don't dare open my shop," she said. "If they damage it, who will compensate me?"

The strike was called for by the country's main labour union to force the government to raise the monthly minimum wage which has been unchanged since 1996.

Although the cabinet on Tuesday agreed to a $130 increase a month to $330, the GCTL said it was nowhere near enough.

The union is demanding that the minimum wage be increased to $600 but the government has balked at such a raise, and Finance Minister Jihad Azour has warned it could lead to rampant inflation.

RELATED: Inflation touches 10% in Lebanon

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