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Many secrets have begun to be revealed about the Beirut port explosion disaster on August 4, highlighting the widespread corruption and smuggling into Lebanon’s vital facility, especially by the Hezbollah terror group, which according to US reports, turned the facility into a den for smuggling activities including weapons and drugs.
Lebanese affairs experts spoke about the party’s control over the port’s joints and its availability of a quick “line” within it, allowing it to get through whatever it wants without being monitored.
In 2019, a statement from the US embassy at the time confirmed that “Hezbollah took advantage of a line to facilitate the passage of materials, including drugs and weapons, through the port of Beirut.”
In a lengthy report on rampant corruption at the port, Agence France-Presse confirmed that the port of Beirut is a haven for smuggling, tax evasion and bribery.
Party line
“The port is one of the most corrupt facilities,” said researcher Muhammad Shams al-Din of the International Information Center, adding: “There is no effective government control over it, whether to collect or spend money.”
The Port of Beirut was created in 1894, and was managed by a French company, then a private company since 1960. In the early nineties, with the end of the concession of the company, a temporary official committee was appointed to manage it and still is in operation.
In turn, the former head of the State Council, Judge Shukri Sader, confirmed to the agency that it is known that there are Hezbollah assets passing through the port and the airport, in addition to the border crossings.
And in 2019, the US Treasury Department imposed sanctions on a prominent Hezbollah official, Wafiq Safa, for “exploiting Lebanese ports and border crossings for smuggling and facilitating travel on behalf of Hezbollah,” according to a statement from the embassy. from the United States at the time.
After the recent explosion, information about shipments of illegal weapons and dangerous materials stored by Hezbollah in the port continued.
$ 2 billion “fled”
According to the agency, the “work” in the port is not limited to Hezbollah, since a report prepared by a security apparatus a few months ago names at least 5 employees of the customs detachment “prohibits their replacement.”
Lebanon used to depend for most of its commercial operations on the port through which more than 70% of imported goods pass.
The annual revenue of the port administration is about $ 220 million, of which only $ 60 million goes to the state treasury, according to Shams El Din.
As for customs, annual customs evasion, most of the port, is estimated between one and two billion dollars in a country in which the budget deficit during the last two years has ranged between 5 and more than 6 thousand millions of dollars.
Over the years, corruption scandals have been publicized on several occasions and soon his files were returned to the drawers, without anyone being held accountable.
Scanner crisis
The security report shows that port employees, from the youngest to the oldest, and members of the security services who also work there, receive bribes that vary according to the goods that speed up or reduce their transit rates.
As for what’s more dangerous than that, it’s “smuggling,” like guns and drugs, for example, which are sometimes smuggled into used cars, according to the report.
The irony is that the only X-ray scanner in the port is broken.
“The scanner has been out of operation since April 2019 due to a technical failure,” said a customs source, who declined to be named, stating that it is “very old and the cost of repair and replacement of parts exceeds its price.”
The port administration did not change him due to a dispute within the government over his contract.
Investigative journalist Riad Kobeissi, who for years has paid particular attention to the corruption file at the port, believes that “the customs agency is the most corrupt and its largest operation is carried out in the port.” .
Many question the ability of the investigation carried out by the Lebanese state to arrive at the truth on the issue of the explosion due to the lack of trust in the various institutions. Hence the demand of some for an international investigation.
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