Bank robberies by desperate depositors on the rise in Lebanon

Lebanese security forces in front of a bank after the robbery of a customer trying to recover her money, in Beirut, on September 14.

AFP - ANWAR AMRO

Text by: RFI Follow

1 min

Depositors desperate for the drastic restrictions imposed by banks on withdrawals robbed two bank branches on Wednesday to demand that their savings be blocked.

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With our correspondent in Beirut,

In Beirut, a young architect, active in the protest movement, and armed with a dummy revolver, forced her bank to give her 13,000 dollars withdrawn from her account, to treat her sister suffering from cancer. 

The Hollywood scene, filmed by the young woman and by accomplices of an association for the defense of the rights of depositors, made the rounds of the networks.

Sali Hafez fled by jumping out of a window before quietly giving an interview a few hours later on local television.

In Aley, 20 km southeast of Beirut, the robber was less lucky.

He was arrested by law enforcement.

In mid-August, the same modus operandi was used by an angry depositor who forced his bank to hand over some of his savings to treat his father.

His gesture aroused the sympathy of a

.

The proliferation of this type of action illustrates the desperation of depositors to be able to recover by legal means their savings blocked by banks since 2019. 

Most judges refuse to receive or consider complaints from depositors, and the government has taken no effective action to safeguard customers' rights in the face of arbitrary and illegal decisions by banks.

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• Lebanon