A section of the Port of Beirut’s massive grain silos, shredded in the 2020 explosion, collapsed in a huge cloud of dust on Sunday after a weeks-long fire, caused by grains that had fermented and ignited in the summer heat. The northern block of silos collapsed after what sounded like an explosion. It was unclear if anyone was injured. The 50-year-old, 157-foot-tall silos withstood the force of the blast two years ago, effectively shielding western Beirut from the blast, which killed more than 200 people, injured more than 6,000 and heavily damaged entire neighborhoods. . In July a fire broke out in the north block of silos due to fermenting grain. Firefighters and soldiers were unable to put it out and it smoldered for weeks, releasing a foul smell that spread widely. The environment and health ministries last week issued instructions to residents living near the port to stay indoors in well-ventilated areas. The silo’s collapse on Sunday comes just days before the second anniversary of the 2020 eruption, one of the biggest eruptions in Lebanon’s troubled history. It came less than a year after an uprising rocked the country, with hundreds of thousands protesting entrenched sectarian political parties. The explosion also precipitated Lebanon’s economic crisis, costing billions of dollars in damages and destroying thousands of tons of grain.
UN peacekeepers killed 2 and wounded at least 15 UN peacekeepers returning from leave opened fire at a border post between the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda, killing at least two people and wounding at least 15, the UN mission and Congolese officials said on Sunday. Tensions between the population in restive eastern Congo and the UN peacekeeping force have risen dramatically in the past week, with nearly 20 people killed in protests calling for the force to leave the region. Bidou Keita, head of the UN mission in Congo and special representative of the UN secretary-general, said she was shocked by the shooting in Kasidi, a border town in Congo’s North Kivu province. He said it was unclear why the peacekeepers opened fire. He said he has contacted the soldiers’ country of origin to begin legal proceedings. Their nationalities were not given. The Congolese government condemned the shooting, confirming the provisional toll of two dead and 15 wounded. Protesters accuse peacekeepers of failing to protect civilians amid rising violence. The mission has more than 16,000 uniformed personnel in Congo, according to the United Nations.
Sadr supporters camp in parliament for 2nd day With mattresses strewn, food trucks and protesters playing lawmakers, hundreds of followers of a powerful Shiite cleric camped inside Iraq’s parliament on Sunday after tearing down security walls around the building and storming the previous day. The protesters – supporters of cleric Moqtada al-Sadr – have vowed to stage an uninterrupted occupation to derail the efforts of their opponents from Iran-backed political groups to form Iraq’s next government. Their demands are high: early elections, constitutional amendments and the ouster of Sadr’s opponents. The developments have plunged Iraq deeper into political crisis as a power struggle unfolds between the country’s two major Shiite groups. Sadr has not visited the scene but has been rallying his supporters, tweeting on Sunday that the sit-in was “a great opportunity to fundamentally question the political system, the constitution and the elections”. The Shiite cleric called on all Iraqis to join the “revolution”, a sign that the sit-in is likely to become a protracted event. On Saturday, protesters used ropes and chains to tear down concrete walls around the heavily fortified Green Zone in Baghdad and then flooded into the assembly building. It was the second such breach in the past week, but this time they did not disperse peacefully. The parliamentary takeover showed Sadr using his large base as a pressure tactic against his rivals in the Coordination Framework – an Iranian-backed alliance of Shiite parties – after his party failed to form a government despite winning the greater number of seats in the federal elections held in October. Iranian border guards and Taliban forces reportedly clash: Iranian border guards clashed with the Afghan Taliban, Iranian media reported, the latest cross-border exchange since the Taliban seized power in neighboring Afghanistan a year ago. Iran’s semi-official news agency, citing Iran’s deputy interior minister, said Taliban forces first opened fire on Iranian guards, forcing them to return fire until the exchange subsided about an hour and a half later. Clashes have erupted repeatedly between Iranian security forces and Afghan Taliban forces along the border since the Taliban took over Afghanistan in August 2021.
